Locked Inside
by Emerald-Latias
Summary: [AU] Squall has been waiting for the long weekend to arrive, but after something goes awry after his last period history test, will he and another unfortunate student be able to even get out of the locked up Balamb High?
1. Chapter I – Long Weekend Anticipation

**Locked Inside**

**Summary** – (AU) Squall has been waiting for the long weekend to arrive, but after something goes awry after his last period history test, will he and another unfortunate student be able to even get out of the locked-up Balamb High?

**A/N** – This is my first fic, so reviews and constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated. Please note that the first chapter will be somewhat long in order to establish things.

**Disclaimer** – I do not own anything from Final Fantasy 8, this disclaimer will apply to any future chapters as well.

Well, I hope that you'll enjoy this, just remember to review afterwards!

**P.S**_ – Sorry if this starts off a little slow at first and if the characters are OOC. _

_**Edit** **(07/05/06)** – Just fixed some spelling and formatting errors_.

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**Chapter I – Long Weekend Anticipation**

'_BEEEP! BEEEP! BEEEP! BEEEP-'_

Squall Leonhart awoke with a jolt at the sound of his alarm clock. It was like this every morning, he didn't particularly like that buzzer very much, but it got the job done by waking him up fairly quickly.

'_Well, at least I won't need to hear it for next… what …three mornings.'_ He thought in realization that today was the Friday before the long weekend.

Lately, Squall had been finding himself looking forward to the long weekend just like the majority of the other students at Balamb high school. Not for the parties and the alcohol, mind you, but for the chance to catch up on the things his that his hectic schedule didn't allow him to do lately, namely to catch up on his reading, gunblade practice and maybe to get some more sleep if that was even possible.

Squall wasn't like many other students in this way, he did not care for partying and drinking like most 17-year olds did, instead, he preferred to do the aforementioned things he hadn't had the time to do, which was obviously reading and to practice gunblading. In general, he wasn't considered very social at all, in fact, if many people had to describe him, the main descriptions would end up being along the lines of smart, anti-social, reserved and possibly cold-hearted.

After coming out of his small reverie, he slowly got out of bed, walked to the bathroom adjacent to his room and peered briefly at his own reflection after subconsciously brushing his teeth. The reflection showed a 5'8" seventeen-year old boy with messy, chocolate-brown hair, stormy-blue eyes and a somewhat muscular medium-size build. Not to mention he was currently wearing navy-blue pajama bottoms. In assessment of his current untidy appearance, Squall decided to take a quick shower.

12 minutes later, after showering, he got dressed in a white, long sleeve shirt with a single dark-blue stripe down each separate sleeve, along with his favorite pair of non-descript black leather pants and adorned his neck with his signature Griever necklace. Afterwards, he then proceeded to head downstairs towards the kitchen.

As he was slowly descending the stairs, a bright orange note on the fridge caught his eye. His pace doubled in curiosity, and before he knew it, Squall found himself plucking it off the fridge and reading it.

_Squall, I have to leave for the long weekend for that meeting in Esthar, I got a call this morning from Kiros, and he told me that the meeting was bumped up to tomorrow. I won't be back until Monday night._

_Love, Dad_

_P.S – I took the car so I could make it time to catch the next train, so you'll have to take the bus. Sorry!_

"Hmph, maybe this weekend will even better than I thought." Squall murmured to himself sarcastically while opening the fridge door to retrieve an apple to eat. He had no time for a proper breakfast since the bus came a lot earlier than the time he usually left in the morning.

It wasn't that he didn't like his father Laguna, but there were some times when his cheerful and clumsy demeanor could just drive him insane, especially if he had to prepare for a meeting for anything the day before.

For example, the last meeting he had to prepare for, Laguna had asked Squall if he knew where his cue-cards were at least a half-dozen times. On top of that, he couldn't sleep much after the racket his father made whilst searching for them. The sad part was that they were actually in his back pocket all along. But for the most part, except when he's preparing for important meetings, Laguna was an all-round good parent (Squall's mother had died a long time ago). Plus, his clumsiness did provide for some extra entertainment from time-to-time.

After eating his apple and hastily putting the remainder of the things he needed for school in his backpack (Food, finished homework, etc.), Squall headed out the door and locked it promptly. However, something seemed to be picking at him in his thoughts.

'_Wait a minute… I know I'm forgetting something important, but what? Ugh, I have no time for these stupid mind games..'_ He then paused between mid-thought and then came to a conclusion, _'Oh Hyne, now I know, it's my gunblade! I left it inside!'_

Squall quickly unlocked the door and dashed inside his home and went upstairs to grab his Revolver case, which obviously contained his Revolver, from under his bed. After quickly exiting his house yet once more, he mentally punished himself for forgetting such an important thing for school today.

Normally, Balamb High wouldn't allow such weapons to be brought at school, yet today was an exception just for a few people. There were new self-defense/weaponry lessons (classes that taught students how to defend themselves with weapons) available to anyone who had a spare at first in their schedule.

Squall had signed up for this since he indeed had a spare to spare during that time slot, but he didn't sign up for the self-defense part of the lesson at all. He knew all of the defensive techniques already; it just enabled him to get some more practice time in. But, the downside to these 'classes' was that the lessons were only held every second Friday, and because Seifer Almasy also attended the class.

For as long as Squall knew him, even possibly as far back as kindergarten, Seifer was always trying to pick on him or trying to tick him off by doing something, whether it was name calling, inflicting physical pain on him, provoking him, among other things, you name it, he did it. If there was one person he hated in the world, it was definitely Seifer.

Pushing these thoughts aside, Squall just made it in time to catch the bus he usually never took, looking for an empty seat. He managed to find one near the back of the bus, trying to ignore the stares of people that probably wondered why he was even on the bus. He didn't bother to respond to the stares, he just kept a stoic, icy look on his face, nor did he even try to find a seat next to a friend like most people did; he didn't have any friends.

Sure, there were people that he sometimes talked to, but they weren't his friends. Squall knew that they just talked to him in order to attempt to figure him out like so many others wanted to do. But it wasn't that he didn't want friends, he just preferred his solitude. Solitude, in Squall's opinion, had always been in one way or another, his best friend.

"Lets just hope that the rest of the day will go by faster…" He mouthed, barely audible under his breath as he stared solemnly through the bus windowpane. Little did he know, someone had heard this remark and slightly pitied him.

Following a long, boring, 30-minute bus ride, he finally made it to school. Squall exited the stuffy bus with new energy, as he took in some fresh air for the first time in half-an-hour. This always managed to perk him up in the morning. The presence of small building (It was an exclusive school), which students and staff members alike knew as Balamb high school, stood right in front of Squall.

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Walking through the main hallway, the brown-haired teenager managed to make a beeline to his locker with dignity and grace through the same thicket of senior football players that usually hung around near the vicinity of his locker every morning, without being pummeled for once.

For Squall, this deemed as a major achievement since Seifer just so-happened to be the captain of the swarm of a team that _naturally _gave him a hard time. Or **maybe** they just **happened **to do that because a certain 6'1", blonde-haired, green-eyed, pain-in-the-arse captain wanted to make sure he saw Squall suffer at least a bit every day. Since physical pain was a way to suffer and he had connections with the team by being their captain, put two-and-two together and talk about evil. It was hell for Squall; maybe today would be better in terms of luck. Or not.

'_Maybe Seifer's going soft? '_ He thought in consideration from today's events, '_Nevermind, there's no chance of that happening in the near future. Better not chance this good luck; I've got to get away from here…fast.'_

After opening his locker, Squall carried out his plan. Within a period of 18 seconds, he put away his backpack, grabbed his gym bag and the Revolver case again, and then quickly proceeded to close the locker. As he headed towards the gym for the self-defense class, his pace augmented to that of a semi-dash, ignoring all of stares he was currently receiving due to this burst of speed; he did **not **want to push his luck today by sticking around the swarm.

He reached the gym by following the usual route to the end the main corridor, followed by a left turn and opening the second last door to the right. Inside, he spotted the usual crowd of classmates, minus Seifer, he was always late on purpose, Zell Dincht, Irvine Kinneas, Quistis Trepe, a girl with dark hair, whose name escaped him at the moment, and a dozen other lesser-known students. But today, there was an additional student not yet seen before in the crowd. One short, brown-haired, green-eyed girl with nunchakus in hand, grinning ear-to-ear as soon as she saw Squall. It was Selphie Tilmitt who had just peeled herself away from the crowd and was coming towards him.

'_Hmm.. Selphie decided to take the class.'_ He thought briefly before the interruption of speech.

"Hi Squall!" Selphie chirped happily, "I decided to take this class after all, like you suggested! I'll bet it'll be loads of fun!"

Selphie was one of Squall's 'pseudo-friends' to which he spoke a word or two to on occasion if she was the one who started the mini conversation that they sometimes had in the hallways, but he never really considered her as a friend. The funny part was that he had only briefly mentioned that he had this newly-available class, not that she should take it, so in conclusion, Squall thought people could be plain odd sometimes.

"Whatever."

After blowing off Selphie, he then disappeared into the guys changing room. Walking into the room, there were several people from the football team currently changing into their gym clothes for a weight-training class, located upstairs via a stairwell near the gym itself. Squall knew this because the last time he had a S.D class he had the pleasure of getting punched by several football players when they recognized him after he simply asked why they were there. Never did he ask anyone that question again. Period.

Squall took off his necklace and placed it neatly inside his bag, and then he took off his long-sleeve shirt and swiftly put on his Balamb High gym shirt, his bare stomach left uncovered for only a few mere seconds. The gym shirt was just a simple white T-shirt with a small version of the school's logo on the right side of the chest. Then he did the same for his leather pants by switching them for plain black shorts. The truly weird thing was that the football players did nothing to provoke him before, during, or after he changed.

'_Maybe they're nothing without their leader.'_

He put away the clothes in his bag, put that same bag in a locker, picked up the Revolver case yet once more and quickly reappeared in the gym. The morning bell had just ringed as he had just done so.

The morning announcements started blaring about useless upcoming school events and other things that did not concern Squall. So he simply tuned out the noise in his mind, unsheathed his Revolver and started practicing basic techniques until the speaker's sound had stopped and the teacher's sound had replaced it. He was taking attendance.

"Seifer Almasy." Mr. Janis, an average-sized man with short black hair, stated with no emotion what so ever.

Only silence was heard. There was no 'Here!' or 'Here.' to be heard.

"Nevermind, I'll just mark him late, Hyne knows he'll pop in here any minute now…" He quipped before continuing.

"Zell Dincht."

"Here!" Zell said loudly while jumping into the air with his hand extended at the same time as if he wanted some kind of attention, or that it had something to do with not forgiving the teacher for that one time when marked him absent even though the short blond was there. Attendance proceeded this way until the instructor mechanically recited the last name on the list.

"…And finally, Selphie Tilmitt."

"I'm here!"

"Okay, today's schedule will be a bit different than normal, since there is another student who has joined our numbers, I will have to take the time to make sure that she catches up." He continued on, "So, the rest of you will be left to your own devices until Miss Tilmitt over here, has caught up completely. But-"

"We can't leave the gym. Unless if class is finished. Or else we will be sent to the office if caught doing so." Seifer interrupted in a droning, mock-authorative voice after entering the gym late (as usual) upon hearing the first bit. "Am I right instructor? Or what?"

Seifer always had a knack for getting under the teachers' skin by any means possible. With Mr. Janis, the best tactics of annoying him was either – A) Chewing gum loudly in his presence, or B) Beating him at finishing his own sentences – especially ones about school rules, which incidentally, Seifer never followed. That drove him nuts, and today was no exception. Squall just hoped that he didn't have gum.

"Seifer, get dressed now, and if you're not quick about it I'll have you do 20-"

"_Laps, instructor?_ Gee, how did I know you were going to say that? _No wait, maybe you'll have me do 20 women! _Yeah, that'd be nice." The tall blonde finished the sentence with such a level of sarcasm that even Squall couldn't even manage to beat.

Seifer turned around momentarily to smirk at the black-haired instructor just before retreating into the boys' locker room, knowing that he achieved thoroughly to piss the instructor off completely, especially when he heard students laughing hard at the teacher's crimson face of embarrassment.

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In a nutshell, today's self-defense class was so far, in Squall's opinion, relatively boring. Up until now, Mr. Janis had been juggling most of his time trying to get Selphie caught up and trying to control Seifer for once. He failed at completing either task. So in turn, Squall also had a very good inkling that the rest of the class would end up being left to their own 'devices' all period, and there was just so many times one can practice slashing air without falling sleep with complete boredom.

'_Why can't the school just expel Seifer? It'd make everyone else **a lot **happier. Well, maybe not the football team… or the cheerleaders if football got canceled because- Nevermind!'_ Squall had been contemplating this for quite some time, as he was taking a break from practicing base-level techniques, which by now, were so permanently engraved in his head that he could possibly do them flawlessly in his sleep.

A bit later, while Squall was on the verge of falling asleep after repeating simple defensive techniques after what felt like the thousandth time, when Selphie accidentally whacked herself hard on the forehead with the other end of her nunchaku, rendering herself unconscious. Since the instructor had to bring Selphie to the nurse, the rest of the class was dismissed.

Instead of changing into his regular clothes and leaving class like all of the other students seemed to be doing, Squall continued practicing more intensely, hoping to get the most out of the remaining 10 minutes of class by practicing more advanced techniques since no one was there to gawk at him. The last thing he needed was a fan club, a fan club that would most likely end up with Selphie Tilmitt as president.

Squall thoughts darted towards assessing his new freedom, _'Now this is much better, no more pretending that you only know simple base-level stuff without getting in trouble. If only I could get something other than air to practice with though…'_

He worked himself in a heavy sweat until two minutes before the bell. That's when Seifer strode up to him with the usual smirk on his cocky, arrogant face. Apparently, Squall wasn't the only one left after all.

"Hey Puberty Boy, didn't you hear? Class was dismissed, or are you just looking for some **real** practice?" He jeered, slashing the air downward with his Hyperion, then bringing it back up for a moment to poke Squall's throat like some kind of threat.

'_Seifer probably knew about that if he stuck around and saw me practice those advanced techniques so hard earlier. Damn him! He's making this too hard to pass up!'_

None the less, Squall had been itching to duel someone to test his skills but he wasn't sure that someone should be Seifer. If he lost to him, Squall knew that he'd lose a lot more than just the duel; his dignity would surely be at the top of the list. When he started to take time to consider the offer a bit more, this achieved to make Seifer impatient, he wanted a quick direct response, not an hour of meditating over a simple question.

"Will you give me an answer already Leonhart! I don't have all day, you know." Seifer said in annoyance, his impatient and fiery nature was surely getting the best of him.

Squall had made a final verdict in his head, '_Might as well, being that he's the only other person with some amount of skill with a gunblade, it should prove interesting regardless. Maybe if I beat him that'll get him off my case for a while.'_

Originating from a somewhat loose, natural stance, he started to slowly take several steps backwards, still facing Seifer with an eerie stare, blue-gray eyes always focused on the tall blonde's greens, creating an adequate space between him and his adversary. Then he stopped with his Revolver still loosely at his side, gripping the hilt tighter than usual.

"Fine." Squall said in a low tone barely louder than a whisper, head nodding up derogatively during mid-completion of the one-word response; he did **not **feel like losing to Seifer.

'_Do your worse Seifer, I dare you to.'_ He voiced inside his head, keeping the somewhat malicious glare directed at his opponent.

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The bell had actually rung not too long after Squall had distanced himself from Seifer, but neither really cared about it though; the anticipation of battle was too tempting to pass up.

Squall started the match on the offensive, attempting to strike at the blonde's upper body to release the rage that was causing a lack of internal focus. The pair of blades eventually clashed, emanating tiny sparks through force, slowly edging closer to his rival's face until Seifer put more effort into his counter.

Hoping that his weight would throw him off, Squall quickly sidestepped to halt the counter against Seifer's blade. As previously predicted, he stumbled a bit, and enabled Squall to loop around him to get at his backside, but Seifer was one step ahead; he swiftly turned, blocking the attack at an upward angle, causing Squall to break off his attack.

In desperation not to give Seifer the upper hand, he stepped back and quickly charged forwards on the offensive yet again. This time, Squall had his blade more horizontal than before, it seemed to prove useful since Seifer was trying even more to keep even more sparks at bay, away from his face. However this advantage did not last long when the lack of traction from the gym's floor was starting to make them slide. Not wanting to lose ground, the pair of combatants both edged away from each other, some how managing to switch sides as both tried to catch the other off-guard by identical high attacks- turned slide movements by implied effort among both parties.

The force of the movement almost made both Squall and Seifer to slide nearly to the opposing sides of the gym, but Squall remedied this lack of friction with a quick turn of a heel, meanwhile Seifer had achieved the same result by lowering himself a bit and using his free hand to stop the sliding motion.

After all movement stopped, the two teenagers quickly eliminated the large gap between them by dashing towards each other, upon confrontation, Squall attacked Seifer by an underhanded blade movement, thus used for countering his rival's over-head swooping attack, countless swerving techniques and sidestepping in circular, dance-like fashion followed shortly thereafter in attempt to gain supremacy.

When Seifer decided to swiftly escape the repetitive tight confinement of side-steps and swerve-like motions, he spun backwards to create room to get out, Squall seized this chance to deliver a strong downward sideways swiping motion to move the Hyperion blade out of the way, causing Seifer to look down in distraction for a second. Then, Squall acted on impulse to take advantage of the situation and dashed towards him, slashing forward. Unfortunately for Squall, he did not connect, as Seifer ran behind him to avoid the blade, this caused Squall to lose a split-second as he stumbled forward since he slashed hard with far too much power through the much-lighter gym air and not his desired opponent. As a smart precaution, Squall turned around quickly to make sure that the blonde did not gain any more leverage by means of a sneak attack.

Oddly enough, Squall only ended up seeing Seifer taunting him in a pose, with Hyperion slung over his right shoulder, free hand extended, moving his middle and index fingers back-and-forth in unison with a smirk, as if he was beckoning Squall to come over to his side of the gym to come at him to fight some more, instead of being face-to-face in a situation of close-range attack.

A small thought surfaced for a split-second, taking Squall's mind of the match for a moment, _'Seifer, your arrogance is going to cost you your life someday, or better yet, the match. Stupid idiot…'_

The pair advanced into a series of attacks, moving back and forth between hits. This time, Squall was on the defensive, blocking, while Seifer was delivering strikes in a fencer-like stance, height playing a key factor. After the third connection between blades, Squall regained some leverage as he swung his Revolver to the side, making his opponent's gunblade recoil backwards, slightly hitting that same opponent in the chest with the broad side of his own blade. Complete leverage favored Squall as he perpendicularly slashed towards his opponent's head, leaving the blonde very vulnerable when his own blade was inching near his forehead from vain defense. Seifer had been forced to lower himself in an awkward position in order to escape bathing in blood from his own blade. Defeat seemed inevitable for Seifer. Or so Squall thought.

Seifer smartly sprung upwards, using the force in his long legs to act like a spring, which was quite an impressive feat in itself, then he quickly backed off and went straight back into battle with two strong swipes, catching Squall slightly off-balance. But Squall came right back when Seifer overdid it on the third swipe, staggering just like Squall had done earlier by not connecting with anything when he had intelligently ducked. Not knowing what to expect, Seifer just carelessly lashed his blade back out from previous recoil to keep his opponent away as he regained posture. This caused Squall to jump backwards to avoid the assault.

'_Hmm, Seifer's tougher than I thought, maybe I should fight harder, give him a challenge.' _Squall thought as he and Seifer took a moment to catch their breath at opposite sides of the gym.

As both parties stopped their momentary rest, Squall gave his hardest effort and went all-out against Seifer; he swiped the air hard in fury, and then connected with his Hyperion on his second slash by lashing back his Revolver from the recoil caused from the first. Then a blitz of slashes to his blocking adversary's blade went unleashed by the blue-eyed demon soon followed thereafter, leaving a wide-eyed Seifer nearly defenseless in shock; he hadn't anticipated this kind of fighting from Squall, not now, not ever.

Seifer however, did manage to cut the flurry of attacks after hooking Squall's blade out of the way when the brown-haired teenager tried to deliver a strong hack, then Seifer proceeded to drive Squall away from him by swiping Hyperion in his general direction, causing Squall to jump sideways and away from the green-eyed blonde.

The match started to approach its end when Squall twirled his Revolver once to gain momentum, and then started to run yet again at Seifer preparing for the final stretch of the match. Seifer also started to run towards Squall, but at a much slower pace. Something odd was going on, and Squall knew it.

'_Seifer must have something up his sleeve…'_

The blonde did have something up his sleeve. Instead of clashing blades with Squall as he approached him, he unleashed a surprise Fire attack, making Squall clatter to the floor along with his Revolver, even though the gunblade did help block most of the illegal spell (There was no magic allowed on school grounds). Squall found it especially hard to get up quickly, due to the pain the magic caused, but before he managed to fully get up, he noticed that Seifer had his gunblade propped upward, ready to strike and Seifer himself had an never-before seen maniacal glint in his usually-smug eyes. Squall's internal thoughts buzzed at this glint,

'_What the **hell **are you doing…'_

Squall's eyes widened in shock and his body moved slightly as the blade went slicing diagonally near his right eye just across the other side of the bridge of his nose, a line of his blood splattered onto the gym floor as the bloodied gunblade left his face. Rage instantly filled Squall as the blood was dripping off his face, staining his shirt and the floor.

Squall's newly acquired fury and anger erupted inside of him, _'How dare you do this to me, I'll make you pay dearly for what you did if it's the last thing I do!'_

On his knees, he slowly turned his head to stare at the psycho who gashed his face for a split-second, got up on his feet by sliding sideways, gained power by dragging the Revolver on the gym floor causing massive sparks and then, full of anger, hate, and fury, he mercilessly slashed Seifer's bewildered face, giving him an identical gash across his nose. Squall's vow of revenge was satisfied as he saw his rival's blood spill onto the floor mixing with his own. Breathing heavily after using the last of his energy, Squall collapsed; an unconscious Seifer on the blood-bathed ground was the last thing he saw.

The battle-worn Squall Leonhart and Seifer Almasy had both passed out, the pair both lying unconscious on their battle-forged pool of blood with identical gashes across their faces, everything almost tinged in crimson red.

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Several hours later, Squall had awoken in a completely different setting, obviously very different from gym floor. He was still in his bloodstained gym clothes, yet he felt no dried-up blood caked on his face, although it was very sensitive to the touch.

'_White walls, white curtains, white beds, passed out Seifer in a white bed, where am I?'_

'_-Wait. I must be in the infirmary, but why does my head hurt so much?'_

After that final thought, the resident doctor, Dr. Kadowaki, walked to the foot of his bed and picked up one of those built-in clipboards, which Squall assumed noted his current status.

"So you've finally woke up Mr. Leonhart, how are you feeling?" She asked in a friendly tone, still holding the aforementioned clipboard.

Trying to be as brief as possible, Squall replied, "…I'm okay, but my head hurts."

"Looks like your eyes are focusing. You should be fine. The pain you're experiencing is from that wound to your forehead. I'll give you some pills to dull the pain, but next time, take it easy in training. Next time you might not be so lucky."

"Tell that to Seifer."

"That Seifer…" She paused to glance at him from across the room, "…Won't listen to anyone. Why don't you ignore him?"

"I can't just run away."

"You wanna be cool, huh? Well, don't get hurt in the process." Dr. Kadowaki quickly went to retrieve the medicine and gave it to Squall. She continued, "If you're feeling better, I can write you a late pass for your last period, which is…"

"-Grade 12 History." he added.

"Right. Okay…" She then paused to finish the note, "…There we are, your clothes and gunblade case are on that table right beside you, and I'll send you with some energy bars just in case if you're feeling faint later on. Any questions?"

Squall did have one or two questions on his mind, but was slightly hesitant on asking the doctor. A pause then followed, but a moment later, he decided to take the plunge and filled the void.

"Who exactly found me and Seifer?"

"That happened to be Miss Heartilly." Dr. Kadowaki quickly recalled. The name suddenly sparked a revelation in Squall's head.

'_That's who that was in the crowd; the black-haired girl's name was Rinoa Heartilly, now I remember. But why did she come back to the gym? If memory serves, she has Art with Selphie at second, and that's at the other side of the school. Odd…'_

Squall took the plunge yet again with his second question, "There's one more thing…"

He hesitated again.

"Yes?"

"Will this wound affect anything at all?" To Squall, the question seemed even dumber outside his head.

"No, your injury's not serious. It'll probably leave a scar though." And with that response, she closed his divider curtains and left him to give him some privacy to change into his regular clothes.

Soon after that, he finished changing and headed out of the infirmary to his locker to get his things for history class.

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As he walked down the hallways to get to his locker, he received a record number of stares, or to be more precise, a record number of people gaping at his new scar. Some of them started whispering among themselves, but Squall didn't care, he just gave the onlookers the usual icy glare.

"Can this day get any better…?" He muttered to himself sarcastically instead of internally voicing his misery. Today, his usual silent nature seemed to be taking a long vacation to the Closest Island to Hell.

After somehow managing to make it to the second floor, Squall got to his history class 7 minutes late, so then he simply handed the teacher, Mrs. Kramer (which they all referred to as Mrs. Edea), the note from Dr. Kadowaki. After reading it, she nodded in acknowledgment, and Squall took his usual seat, the first desk in the third row. Mrs. Edea now handed out the big history quiz scheduled for today.

Many students sighed and groaned, but Squall just thankful that nobody except for Mrs. Edea and Rinoa (She was in this class too) knew about the scar across his face, that is, until later, when the others caught a glimpse during test time. Squall was very thankful for the test; it forced people to keep quiet.

Squall finished his test in 25 minutes-flat after receiving it, since he had always happened to be very good in history for no apparent reason. Then he promptly gave in his test, picked up his things, and went to through the door to the room across, following Mrs. Edea's rules subconsciously.

One thing about any class with Mrs. Edea was that, if a student ever finished a test before the period itself was over, they went to this smaller room adjacent from the classroom. It was a very odd rule, but it was actually advantageous the students; it enabled them to talk and do other things without getting in trouble. Plus, it also helped the slower students to finish the test without distraction or noise from students who were already finished.

However, Squall was usually the only one that finished the test before class ended around 98 percent of the time, so he just read in solitude, and during the times when someone else was also present, he still read. At the moment, the room itself was very untidy, books stacked unevenly on crooked tables instead of being in the dusty chipped wooden shelves on the walls where they should have been. Old, unused desks and chairs were scattered everywhere, and to top it off, the room itself was very warm today.

In regards to the current state of things, Squall took a mental note, '_Hmph, looks like as if tornado swept past here… Oh well… Actually, now that I think about it, it's kind of hot in here…'_

He pulled himself a chair and a desk and dragged it to the far, right-hand corner. Squall found himself an old issue of Weapons Monthly magazine from the stack of random books to read, then sat down and propped up his feet comfortably on the desk itself. 15 minutes later, when Squall heard someone else enter the room, he didn't bother looking up from his magazine, and so, he didn't know who it was. As long as who ever it was didn't gawk at his scar, he didn't particularly care who or what it was.

As the heat radiated throughout the room furthermore, it seemed to intensify during the next few minutes and Squall found it harder and harder to concentrate on his reading, as he continuously went in-and-out of a light stupor.

After coming out yet again from his daze, Squall started to contemplate these sleepy spells that he seemed to be experiencing at the moment, '_Maybe this is happening to me because of my scar, maybe I should go see Dr. Kadowaki.'_

Then he paused in an after-thought, '_Nevermind, there's only 10 minutes left before school's done and I would of have had these sleepy spells earlier if that was the case. It's probably just this stupid heat…'_

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"Squall, **please** wake up!" A voice said urgently, shaking his left arm.

'_What? …I'm awake…'_ He pondered groggily, not realizing that he wasn't saying anything out loud.

"Oh please wake up Squall!" The female voice called out loudly.

'_Huh… where am I?'_ His eyes started fluttering open at the thought as he realized that he was somewhere unfamiliar to him in complete darkness.

"Squall, thank goodness you're awake!" The same female said in a mildly joyful tone before continuing, "Something bad has happened!"

Squall rubbed his eyes and then opened them; his eyes were trying to focus properly from the current lack of lighting, trying to figure out where he was and who was talking to him. He peered down and saw that same issue of Weapons Monthly that he was reading earlier in the other room in history class.

He took a second look in horror.

'_Don't tell me-'_

"-I'm stuck in school for the long weekend!" He finished his thought aloud in shock, which happened to be something very uncharacteristic for him. He then looked up and saw the unfortunate student stuck with him-

……_It was Rinoa Heartilly._

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**End of Chapter Comments - **Sorry for such a long (and possibly boring) first chapter, but I really wanted to get started on the actual plot by chapter 2, so that things could get interesting faster. I personally prefer longer chapters to shorter ones, but when a chapter is too long, I sometimes tend to lose some interest, so I'll understand if you guys review saying that you found this chapter downright boring.

If you have any suggestions, constructive criticism, or ideas for the plot, please review or send me a PM. Thanks!


	2. Chapter II – Dark Discoveries

**Author's Note – **Thank you guys for such positive reviews! I appreciate every one of them. I'll try to update as much as I possibly can, and I'll make an effort to try to keep approximately the same length for any chapters that I do post up. Just so you guys know, I wasn't sure if the length was too long because I've never had any experience writing fanfiction before, so I'm sorry for my insecurity on the length. Plus, it tends to seem long after re-reading it so many times for correcting mistakes.

Now, time for some chapter reviews!

**Responses to Reviews for Chapter 1**

_DBH_** – **Thanks for compliment on the introduction. Just to let you know, I'm like that when reading fanfiction too; I hate short teasers, especially on stories that have potential for a good plot.

_MyNameIsMoe644_ – I will make an effort to keep the length.

_Carie Valentine_ - I do agree about your comments on short chapters, they don't give much for the imagination as long chapters would, but I'll try to make the plot as interesting as possible without too much drabble!

_DBZ Fanfiction Queen_ – I'm glad that someone noticed those bits of scenes/dialogue from the game itself, I wanted to incorporate a bit of the game into my fic. Cool huh?

As for the second part of your question, it's going to be a little bit of both. I'll focus on both the weekend mainly, plus a bit of the aftermath.

_AndyPenguin_ – As I said in response to the previous review, I'm glad that you noticed that bit from the game itself. It took **a lot** of work to do; I had to watch that FMV over a dozen times to write that scene, so I'm really glad when people noticed my efforts. And I hope that you'll like this next chapter!

_Billie The Kid_ – They won't be just stuck inside that room for the weekend, that's just plain cruel. They'll be able to go around the whole school itself, and there will be a bit of stuff happening between Squall and Rinoa, but I won't tell you what! You'll just to wait and see (and possibly review! Lol!)...

Now that I'm done blabbering, on to the next chapter!

P.S – I'm sorry in advance if Rinoa seems or is a little OOC.

_**Edit** **(30/06/06)** – Just fixed some spelling, flow and formatting errors_.

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**Chapter II – Dark Discoveries**

The situation he was placed in seemed like a nightmare come true to Squall. Being stuck inside a deserted school alone was one thing; being stuck with a girl that he hardly knew was another. After the initial shock of waking up in a desolate school with someone he barely knew had worn off, Squall got out of his chair and started to access the situation in a calm manner; Rinoa just started to panic even more.

'_Okay, I've got to think clearly if I'm ever going to get of here-Nevermind, scratch that thought. Let's just hope that she shuts up long enough to even let me think. Period.'_

With that thought, he was going to tell Rinoa to be quiet, but it wasn't necessary, her whining abruptly stopped as she managed to open the door without a struggle.

"I was afraid that we were going to be stuck inside this room for the whole weekend..." Rinoa said sheepishly in embarrassment from the useless panicking that she'd done earlier. Squall honestly didn't care; he only cared about whether she shut up or not. After that, he continued to contemplate his options yet again.

'..._I might be able to get out if someone is waiting for her at home, or if she has a cell phone. Maybe I can just get hold of a phone in here...' _He paused for a moment, _'But I've got to be careful, don't want to trip any alarms and give the school a fine... I suppose that could be used as a last resort though...' _

When Rinoa noticed that Squall wasn't following her outside the room, she went back in, leaving the door open, and sat down on one of the many desks there was to choose from. She simply waited for Squall to finish pacing back-and-forth in thought or whatever it was he was doing. When it seemed like she wasn't going to be noticed by her also-imprisoned partner, she tried to make conversation to divert attention away from his thoughts.

"I guess Mrs. Edea was too excited about the long weekend and completely forgot about us! Weird huh?"

"Um... _What_? Yeah, I suppose..." Squall barely replied, his mind was elsewhere, intent on finding the solution of escape.

Rinoa picked up on what Squall had been focusing on and smartly changed the topic, "So how do you suppose we're getting out of here? I have a few suggestions, but I'd like to hear yours first if you have any."

Squall stopped pacing as his ears perked up at the question, "Yes, I do have some ideas, but that all depends."

"On...?"

"Do you have some one waiting for you at home, or at least have a cell phone?"

Rinoa's face looked a bit sullen at Squall's question, like as if there was some irony to it, so she simply gave a sigh and answered in a monotone voice, "No, my father's out of town, he had to go to Deling City for the weekend, but even if he were home, he wouldn't care. He'd probably think that I'm at someone's house or something. As for your other question, I left my cell at home… I thought I wouldn't need it today."

Then she continued, "My ideas were somewhat similar to yours so I won't bother saying them, I'd just be repeating you. So, are you all out of thoughts, or is there something else you'd like to share?"

"Well, unless if we can find some kind of phone, we'll just have to survive the weekend inside the school."

"Okay... That's not the kind of answer I was expecting, but it'll do. Then I guess we just have to explore the school, and then make our solution accordingly after we're done exploring. _Right?"_

Squall just nodded in agreement, never had he done so much talking all at one time, but it was for a good cause and not for idle chitchat like most people did. He really hoped that Rinoa wasn't one of those talkative girls like Selphie. Because if they couldn't find a way out, he'd be in for a hell of a _**long** _weekend filled with laryngitis on his part from responding to meaningless, random, one-sided, girly conversations. The pair headed out from the room and into the hallway.

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The hallway itself was very dark and a bit creepy from the lack of students and light. Their steps made small echoes as they walked down the long, eerie hallway. After a small fleeting gaze at Rinoa's anxious expression, Squall tried his best to reduce the noise emitted by his feet to quell the illusion of being followed; he did not want a bundle of nerves stuck with him if they had to stay in the deserted high school.

'_Why am I doing nice things for her?' _He wondered, _'I could have always told her that she's being paranoid and to stop worrying over nothing... Whatever... I still don't understand how somebody can be paranoid when they know perfectly well that no one's here...'_

Rinoa's nerves quieted as they continued to silently scout through the rest of the hallway. Squall was thankful for this until she spontaneously went into a bit of dash down the stairwell, instead of going towards the other corridor that he was planning to take.

'_Why do I have to get stuck with someone who can't even stick around one second to follow plans?' _He sighed after that thought,_ 'Might as well catch her before she trips the Hyne-forsaken alarm...'_

He caught her in the nick of time before she could get the chance to set off the alarm near the outside door, near the base of the stairs. The raven-haired girl let out a yelp of surprise.

"Why did you do **_that?_** Is it some kind of crime to go _downstairs?_" She said in an aggravated tone while turning around to face him, after he pulled her back before she reached the bottom of the stairwell.

"Number one, if you went any further, you would have tripped the alarm," He paused, "-and number two, the school would have been fined for false emergency, in which case, the school would make **us **pay."

"Okay, that's reason enough, but why didn't you just _**say something** _instead of scaring me half to death!" She yelled while leveling herself on the steps to glare at him eye-to-eye. She was very ticked-off with him.

"I just...don't do things that way…" He interrupted his own speech until he was at the top of the stairs, gazing down at her with a look of exasperation, "...I normally don't talk very much."

"Oh, I see now. I'm sorry for yelling at you."

Squall ignored her apology as he headed towards the corridor he actually wanted to follow earlier, he heard Rinoa's footsteps quicken from mid-way up the stairway, and then as she approached him, she slowed down in order to be right behind him.

"So why are we going down this hallway? Isn't there another alarm at the bottom of the stairs from this hallway too?" She inquired.

"No." Squall simply stated back, condensing the answer into a one-word response.

"Oh, okay."

Squall walked casually down the hallway while looking at things randomly, as if he had all of the time in the world, Rinoa simply followed his lead, not questioning his plan of action or thoughts at all. She hated herself for not being able to help the situation at all; she felt so... _useless_, as if she were was actually hindering any progress being made at all. She flat-out loathed this feeling and decided mentally to help him out in any way possible, should an opportunity to do so happened to arise. Meanwhile, Squall just started to think some more.

'_Okay, if I can get in the secretary's office, there should be a phone there. But what if the door's locked? Maybe I could ask her if she has a credit card or something to open the lock. Mm, that should work.'_

They got to the end of the hallway and descended the stairs, he halted and extended his right hand sideways to stop Rinoa just to allow himself to double-check the area to absolutely make sure that there was no security systems nearby waiting for them. There wasn't. Rinoa was a little peeved at this gesture, which got her out of her self-pitying mood to pipe up and speak her mind.

"I know that you did that just to make sure that we didn't trip any '_hidden_' alarms, but you didn't have to block me with your arm. I'm not stupid. I would have gotten the message if you had just stopped suddenly."

Squall didn't respond to this, he just gave her the usual icy glare with his infamous stormy-blue eyes which he was known for and continued on towards the secretary's office as if nothing happened. Rinoa wasn't too pleased with these actions, but she also continued down the steps and tailed him towards the office. Possible freedom of their confinement could be awaiting them both there; the overall mood had lightened up a bit within the next few moments, even though thunder crashing through the night sky could be now heard audibly in the background. As they reached the office, Squall opened the door.

Or at least _tried_ to anyway.

Squall now went and put himself into his all-too familiar thinking-mode again, _'I knew it it'd be locked! ...Might as well ask her for help now, all hope isn't lost just yet...' _

As if on cue, Rinoa's light jogging came to a timely, complete halt as she caught up to Squall, her face frowned slightly in realization of what just happened between him and the door.

Remembering the promise that she made to herself earlier, Rinoa asked him a question, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Being caught off-guard by the question itself, since he was going to ask her nearly the same thing, Squall took a little time to formulate his response, he wasn't adapted to talking a lot without it being thought-through first yet. Moments later, he finally answered.

"If you have a hair pin or a credit card or something very thin, it might open the door..."

"I have a couple of bobby pins in my locker, I'll be right back." Rinoa replied before she started to sprint back down the hallway from whence she came.

Two seconds later, the slight surge of panic present in Squall's eyes made her add a, "Don't worry, my locker isn't near any alarms!" for reassurance purposes when she saw his expression as she rounded a corner towards the stairs.

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After she left his sights, Squall slumped down on the wall facing the office itself. Out of sheer boredom, he surveyed the secretary's office, and to possibly get his mind away from the atmospheric crashes of thunder and lightning. The office itself was completely see-through; glass replaced most of the wall space there would have been there. It also had two doors on either side of the windows; they both had one window in each of them. Inside, was Squall's objective, the lone phone on the back wall.

"I sure hope that it works, I don't want to be stuck here..." He muttered to himself in the darkness, alone, void of human presence apart from himself at the moment. He liked the solitude so he took this precious time to ponder a bit.

'_I wonder how it feels to have a father who doesn't care... I'm sure that it must be tough-' _Then he stopped his train of thought as he realized something important, _'Wait, why am I even thinking about her? Maybe its just pity, I'm pretty sure that's it.'_

As he finished that thought, he saw Rinoa coming back slightly flushed, bobby pins clasped firmly in hand.

_'…She must have ran during the whole time, no wonder she came back so fast.' _He concluded while getting up from his slouched position. The thunderstorm started to intensify, giving off more deafening noise more so than ever. He was about to grab the hairpins from her hand, but Rinoa stopped him from doing so.

"Don't worry Squall. I'll do it by myself." She insisted. So he just stepped aside as she started to pick the door's lock.

Within a few seconds later, he heard a click and Rinoa opened the door and walked in the empty room in a slow, calm manner, as he followed closely behind her he made a calculated assumption that her nerves might be killing her inside.

_'She must be slightly scared with anticipation of the possible outcome. Who wouldn't? The phone could possibly not work at all. Hyne, lets just hope that it does...' _

Squall stood still as she walked up to the back, slowly went past the front desk, tables and chairs that followed, then as she drew near the phone, she picked up the receiver and put it to her ear. Then, Rinoa punched in a couple of numbers, cringing every moment afterwards; Squall guessed that she was now possibly waiting for someone to pick up on the other end.

Proceeding after a delay of at least a minute, Rinoa put back the phone in its holder with disdain, and as she turned around to face him, a metamorphosis in facial expression happened within a fraction of a second, altering from slight annoyance to a look of ..._relief? _

"So..." Squall said while leaning casually against the wall, anticipating her response even though he sort of knew the answer he was going to get from her.

"We're going to have to go to Plan B, the phone itself was dead." Rinoa replied coyly.

'_Dead? I wasn't expecting that, I was expecting her to say that no one to answered...Weird.' _Squall wondered, _'Wait, maybe everything is shut down everything for the long weekend. Oh well... She'd better not be pain in the-' _

"_-Earth_ to Squall, _hello_..." Rinoa said jokingly as she continuously waved her hand in front of his face, after successfully catching his attention, he swatted the hand away.

She continued with a bit of a chuckle, "You know, I can't hear what you're thinking about, you have to speak more often."

"Whatever..."

At that point, Squall left the secretary's office, since there was absolutely no reason to be in there since the phone, and possibly everything electric, didn't work.

"So what do we have to do to prepare for Plan B?" A voice behind him inquired, the same voice that belonged to the girl that he'd be stuck with for 3 days now.

"Well..." He paused to gather some breath for what he was about to say next, which was going to be _a lot_ in his opinion.

"First off, we'll have to gather any food that we have access to and divide it so we'll have something to eat for three days. And secondly, we'll use the hairpins to unlock any doors we'll need, like the bathrooms and such."

"Well, since we're going to be stuck here, let's make the most of it and pretend that we're on some kind of vacation. It might help." She suggested. However, Squall just simply arched an eyebrow and looked at her as if she were some kind of nutcase. She glowered at this response. More thunder pealed.

"Please stop looking at me like I'm a mental patient, 'cause I'm not. What I'm trying to suggest is that we imagine that we're here to have fun and to relax to make it more enjoyable to be stuck here mentally." Rinoa stopped to think of something to say that would appeal to brown-haired teenager who was still looking at her quizzically, "Hyne, you can even practice the gunblading that almost got you seriously injured! Or whatever you find enjoyable for that matter!"

In response, Squall replied with a cold edge in his voice, "Fine. I will, lets just get things prepared for tonight, alright?"

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Squall and Rinoa went to each other's lockers together in order to see what they had in terms of food, which wasn't very much at all. Squall had those energy bars from Dr. Kadowaki, a bottle of water and two leftover slices of pizza from lunch that he didn't eat because of his all-afternoon stay in the infirmary. Rinoa had a bag of chips and leftover lasagna from her lunch, along with a juice box; it was apple juice.

Rinoa voiced her own solution while finishing searching her locker, "Okay, since we don't have much, we'll just have to eat less, let's say about once or twice a day."

Squall was hesitant to add on his own idea to the answer given by Rinoa. _'Might as well, it's not like it's a useless use of speech... Here it goes, I hope that I won't sound stupid...'_

He inwardly sighed and added his own idea as Rinoa was closing her locker, "If we keep busy and filled up on water, it might reduce the need for food."

"Hey those are good ideas, but how would you know that Squall? Are you anorexic or something?"

'_I thought only girls were anorexic, I guess it's true when they say you learn something new everyday...'_ He mused briefly.

"No. I just know that from experience."

"Oh, I see. Well then, let's go to the gym, we need to unlock the locker rooms there, so we can get access to the bathrooms and showers."

The pit of Squall's stomach received a small jolt as they walked towards the gym, what if the blood from duel that took place due to his lapse of self-control was still there? Guilt would surely take over him. He started to ponder yet once more, _'If Rinoa hadn't spotted me and Seifer-'_

"Hey, it looks as if you've seen a ghost or something, are you okay?"

He blinked once and realized that his legs subconsciously brought him to the gym door, which now was standing right in front of him. He nodded and ruffled his chocolate-brown hair a bit; she picked the lock and opened the door with ease. He hated to admit it, but she was getting pretty good at it.

As they went in the gym, the surroundings startled him; the floor was completely cleansed of all traces of blood, as if it was never there in the first place. Rinoa took no notice of this expression. Or so he thought. The brown-haired Leonhart shook off this feeling of shock and returned to his usual stoic look as he leaned against the nearby wall while Rinoa was going to the one locker room.

"Since we're the only ones here, so there's really no use to open both lockers, so I'll just unlock the boys' locker room." She stated with a chipper tone, like it was some kind of the thrill to use the boys' locker room since she was of the opposite gender.

"…Whatever."

Before she had made an attempt to open the aforementioned door, Rinoa made a vocal revelation, "Oops, I guess we don't have to unlock this after all, it's already open. Darn, I was looking forward to using it..."

'_Why was she so excited over a simple thing like that? I mean it's no different than the girls' locker room, I think... She's so strange... I swear that I won't ever understand women. Ever.'_

Rinoa started to walk back towards him; a trace of disappointment still present on her face when she started to talk some more.

"Hey, would it be okay if I took a peek inside the guys' locker room, just to see what it looks like? I've always wanted to know what it looked like in there." She inquired, full of innocence; however it just sounded like she was some kind of weird eccentric to Squall.

"Go ahead. …I don't care." He replied in a slightly cold, careless tone.

"Thanks!"

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When Rinoa came out several minutes later, she nearly tripped as she went back towards Squall, who was still leaning against the wall, after her exploration of the male-species' room intended for gym-usage. She went into a small giggling fit after her 'near-tripping experience', meanwhile, Squall just rolled his eyes at this. A sarcastic thought crossed his mind then, _'This weekend is going to be so much fun that I'm going to be giggling like her by the end of it...'_

"Do you-" Another small fit of giggles interrupted her speech for 2 seconds before she'd continued again, "-guys all take showers at the same time, in that big room full of shower heads?"

Since there was only one possible place that Rinoa could be referring to, Squall nodded once, and mentally cringed the sort of thing she was going to say next.

"Really? In the girls' room it has separate showers. So…wouldn't you guys all see each other naked and stuff?" She said in mild shock of surprise mixed in with small giggles. Squall was getting somewhat annoyed with her immature questions, so he cut her short with an icy tone.

"Guys are different than girls…and we don't care about those kinds of things so let's get out of here."

After answering the question, he promptly exited the gym and started to walk aimlessly down the corridor, trying to pretend that he was the only one there, but he failed miserably as Rinoa caught up to him and made him stop completely somehow with no effort implied what so ever. 

'_Why am I even stopping for her? She must have some sort of invisible hold on me...' _He stopped to turn around to face her with a stoic gaze, arms crossed. When she didn't start to talk right away, he contemplated some more in annoyance,_ 'If she's going to be like this all weekend, might as well trip the alarm right now and get out of here...'_

"Hey, where are you going? Do we have to do anything else for the weekend?" Rinoa wondered.

"No."

"Okay... then where are you going?"

"Nowhere in particular." He replied briefly. In reality, he just wanted to go somewhere by himself to think in solitude.

"Hmm... There's so much I don't understand about you Squall. You're so...mysterious in a way, sometimes I'd like to know what goes on inside your head." Rinoa pondered aloud with a bit of a smile, hoping he'd get the hint.

'_You've been only stuck with me for about a hour or two in the school and you already want to know what's going on inside my head? That's a first. Usually it takes people at least a few months to build interest to want to figure me out. She must be bored...' _Squall internally voiced in his head, of course he didn't say it out loud, because he didn't feel like having anyone know what he felt or thought, especially a semi-stranger like Rinoa.

"…Don't bother."

"Okay then..." She quickly glanced at her watch before continuing, "So where are we going to crash for the night? It's already 11:30."

"...Doesn't matter."

"I have an idea, how about we sleep in the teachers' lounge. I've never been there!" Rinoa said excitedly like a kid in a candy store and right now, Squall wished that she had been allergic to sugar.

_'What's with her, she's making it sound like it's a good thing to be stuck in here... She must be related to Selphie or something, I swear...' _

"Why… do you always find it so thrilling to go somewhere inside the school just because you've never been there? Is it that you like going to places just since they're _'forbidden'_ or something?" Squall inquired rudely, since he had gotten very tired of Rinoa's optimism; it clashed very much so with his own pessimistic, brooding nature.

"Lighten up Squall; I just thought it'd be fun, that's all. Besides, I'll bet that it will be a lot comfier in there than any benches or floors we'd find out here."

"…I don't care." He said in a closing statement, he turned and then started to walk in a fast pace towards in lounge.

"Okay," Rinoa sighed as she started to follow behind him, "…Do you know that you're _impossible?_"

"Yes."

Normally, a person would have laughed a bit after saying a retort like that, but Squall didn't, he kept his silence; it wasn't in his nature to laugh.

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Before retiring to the teachers' lounge for the night, Rinoa had insisted on getting something from her locker, so inevitably, they both made a detour to her locker on the second floor, she attempted to start a conversation while rummaging through her locker.

"So Squall… were you surprised from the major clean-up in the gym? I saw your expression when you looked at the floor, you looked kinda spooked." She mentioned to Squall, who happened to be leaning against the locker beside her.

The question itself had struck a chord with him, and the thoughts came pouring in instantly, _'How did she know about that? She was in front of me... I might as well ask her how she found Seifer and myself in the first place... Nevermind...'_

"Yeah… I kinda was."

Squall reprimanded himself mentally for that previous statement, _'Stupid! Stupid! Why didn't I say something else! Way to go Squall, now she'll probably think that she's getting to you, I never admit things like that! I'm done for...I might as well bite the bullet now and ask her about today...'_

He continued hesitantly, trying to not spill his guts out like before, "_Um_..."

"Yes?" Rinoa said in a tone like if she knew what was coming next.

"How come you were able to find Seifer and me earlier today? Somebody told me that you take the art class at second and if I'm not mistaken, that's at the other side of the building, is it not?" Squall's confidence regained as he continued, he was almost certain that there was something peculiar about this.

"Oh that!" Her face when into in a fierce blush before she continued, "I...uh- _forgot m-my gym bag inside! And, and..."_

'_She's lying; I saw her exit the gym with some kind of blue gym bag. Even if she did forget it, she would have waited until lunch to get the bag, plus she's stuttering and blushing. Hmm, she must be a person who doesn't keep emotions in, I'd bet she wanted to see Seifer or something..._'

As Squall concluded his short thought, her speech and story stabilized, he assumed that she was starting to tell the truthful part of the story, "-_And_ I went to get it before Art class, but then I saw both of you and panicked, so I got Dr. Kadowaki to make sure you guys didn't-."

"-_Die_? I don't think I would have …_died._" Squall finished sarcastically.

She stopped looking in her locker, and gazed at Squall with her deep brown eyes, "No, I was going to say '_get seriously hurt'_, not '_Die_'! You shouldn't be so …so cold all the time, it's not good to be so distant and isolated you know. You'll need to come out of that shell of yours if we're going to survive a weekend together."

He ignored her rant and waited for her to go back to finish looking. Eventually, she did resume looking.

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After Rinoa had found what she'd been looking for, which in this case was a blanket (_'Why would you have a blanket in your locker?' _Squall thought in response to that), they started to walk back.

Squall wasn't starting to feel very good; his forehead was beginning to throb like before; the medication that Dr. Kadowaki had given him seemed to be wearing off. The pain intensified as he and Rinoa walked down the hallway. It got to the point were he was clutching his scar in attempt to help ease the now-agonizing hurt, however it did nothing to help the almost blinding pain. He stopped at the corner and propped himself against the corner; the blanket-holding Rinoa didn't take notice in the dark corridor.

'_This is starting to hurt… **a lot**, I think I'm going to pass out from the pain...No, I can't- I have to make it to the teachers' lounge- I can't… let anything happen, can't let her know about this...can't show weakness-'_

"_Argh_..." Squall's self control wasn't enough, he let escape a noise of intolerable pain, as he couldn't hold the pain inside him anymore, he doubled over slightly.

"Squall?" Rinoa turned around and realized that he wasn't behind her, "Are you okay? Is the scar bothering you? Here, let me feel your forehead."

When she quickly went near him, the blanket-wielding girl let go of her blanket and then moved a few brown strands of stray hair from his face. Before she got to feel his forehead with her hand completely, icy-blue eyes glared upwards, meeting up with her deep browns; it was a look of foreboding present in its depths. The onlooker moved her hand aside as he regained posture; yet the intimidating gaze remained the same.

"Squall… you're burning up!" She shouted aloud with his well being in mind.

'_Why must these things must always happen to me? Why can't she leave me be! ...The pain is becoming unbearable though... I don't know if I can take this much longer...'_

"I'm …_f-_..**_fine_**." He retorted in a low tone, meanwhile, his façade was faltering.

"No you're not Squall, lets just get you to sleep, the rest might help..." Rinoa said in fear, she didn't want him to get hurt in any way if she could help it.

As they both resumed walking, she muttered something somewhat incoherent to herself, _"...Please just hold on Squall, I can't do anything else for now... ...It's all my fault..."_

Squall was fighting the searing pain through the entirety of the march to the lounge so far, even he didn't know if he was going to make it or not. As the trek to their destination progressed, time seemed to standing still- tormenting him in his current condition.

His energy had drained considerably from this, and he was starting to struggle to maintain supporting his own weight as his knees were starting to buckle, making him wobble all over the place. Rinoa took notice of this and helped support him even though he was not keen on letting her help him. Although she was obviously the lighter of the two, she didn't find it hard to support Squall's weight at all. In fact, she was surprised at how light he actually was even though he was at least 4 or 5 inches taller than her, and because she also assumed that he'd be much heavier- considering that he was a guy.

'_I sure hope that she doesn't take advantage of this situation... By the way she was acting earlier;_ _she'll probably try to use this situation to her advantage... She'd better not attempt that...I won't let her...'_ He mused before his mind could only focus on the pain he was experiencing at the moment. His energy and will power was dwindling fast now, he had to rely more on Rinoa to support himself, or he would have probably fallen face-first onto the floor by now. Squall loathed this weakness; he didn't like relying on anyone for anything.

He let go of Rinoa to let her pick at the door's lock; he figured that he could support himself without her for a bit.

However, the nearly-intolerable pain originating from his scar was starting to intensify even more so, and he truly didn't know if he was going to be able to focus on anything other than the unimaginable hurt.

"We're almost there Sq-" A large 'thunk' behind her interrupted Rinoa's sentence, "_Squall! No... _NO!"

Squall had collapsed; he couldn't take the pain any longer. A cascade of tears freshly stained the floor beside him as a crying Rinoa now rushed to think of a way to save him.

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**End of Chapter Comments** – And there we are, Chapter 2 is done! Don't you just hate cliffhangers? I'm so mean... Hehehe... Well I hope that you guys liked the chapter and the length of it! And I'm sorry if Rinoa or Squall was OOC.

So please review with comments, ideas or anything you guys have to say! Thanks!


	3. Chapter III – Surviving Saturday

**Author's Note – **I won't bother you guys with the excuses, I just didn't feel like writing these past months so I apologize for the delay to everybody who was anticipating this next chapter. On another note, I'm happy yet again with the number of positive reviews I received for this chapter, and I'm also happy to hear that I'm portraying the characters right. Now on to the review responses!

**Responses to reviews for Chapter 2**

_trekken46_ – Thanks for the compliment, and I hope this chapter will be good enough as well.

_DBH_ – I'm glad that you enjoyed my portrayal of Squall and Rinoa. As for your question regarding Rinoa - it will be answered soon, actually, there is a reason to why I wasn't specific with description with that scene, so you'll have to keep on reading! And about your suggestion about the cafeteria and infirmary, there are reasons to why I didn't have them go there yet.

For some reason when I read that part when you referred to Squall as 'Mr. Happy', it made me burst out laughing. Oh well, I'm a very odd person in general…

_Silver-nex_ – Yes, Squall will be fine, and I hope that you'll like this chapter!

_Inuyasha1lover_ – Thank you for the compliment and I will try to reduce the amount of times that Squall says 'Whatever', I didn't realize that he said it 4 times in the last chapter! XD

_Carie Valentine_ – The reason why I didn't have them go into the infirmary to sleep is because Squall didn't care where they 'crashed for the night' when Rinoa suggested the teachers' lounge, I used Rinoa's excitement for going somewhere she hasn't been to contrast their different personalities.

_DBZ Fanfiction Queen_ – Thank you for your compliment and I guess that you'll have to sic the Moombas on me because I'm late on writing this chapter.

_**-Is bitten on the leg by Moomba**-_

Ouch! That really hurt! Alright, I'll continue with the chapter soon! Gah! Just hold on, I have one more review to do, and then I'll get on with the chapter, I swear!

Luissquall – Thank you for your review and I hope this will be just as good of a chapter as the others.

Enjoy!

_**Edit** **(06/07/06)** – Just fixed some flow, formatting and dialogue problems_. _God, I can't believe I wrote this crap!_

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**Chapter III – Surviving Saturday**

Squall's eyes fluttered open in consciousness, he caught a glimpse of several small beams of sunlight peeking through the windows as he slowly started to sit up while trying to process the night's events, the last thing he seemed to remember was fainting from the pain emanating from his scar at the teachers' lounge entrance; everything afterwards was foggy and unclear. Squall couldn't picture anything in his mind. He looked around his surroundings in his current sitting position in hopes of something coming back to him.

Nope. It was still very hazy inside his head.

He was in a room with light blue walls, one of which had several bulletin boards with various flyers and papers tacked on for various things. Against the far wall was a table with a coffee machine on it along with a mini-fridge. There were several rectangular tables clustered together, combined surfaces littered with leftover paperwork, files and tests. He came to a conclusion that this was the teachers' lounge itself. Naturally, the blue-eyed teenager's mind went racing.

'_How did I get in here? If I recall correctly, I passed out outside of the lounge -Did Rinoa drag me in here? Wait a minute, something's different here-' _Squall paused momentarily in comparison to last night_, '…I don't have that searing pain anymore… Well almost, I have a dull ache above my eyes…Like I care, it's nothing compared to last night… Did Rinoa do something to me last night? Last time I checked, things like that don't go away without medicine or something… Where is she anyway? '_

The answer to his prior question was answered in two seconds.

Squall glanced sideways; a sleeping Rinoa could be seen on the adjacent couch, he surveyed the snoozing Heartilly for a brief moment. Her head was resting on one of the sofa's arms; her own pale arm was loosely dangling over the edge, legs curled together in a fetal position held together by her other, non-dangling arm.

To Squall, it all seemed to be very Rinoa-esque, for as long as he's known her (which in this case wasn't very long), the current sleeping position she was in seemed to reflect upon her free-spirited, innocent nature accordingly, but there was also something else that didn't seem normal; Rinoa had a bit of a bluish tint in her skin tone. She must have been cold from the current lack of heating. Squall looked down for a second and realized that a pale-yellow blanket was covering his lap; the same one that Rinoa had taken out of her locker yesterday.

It clicked instantly, _'She must have given me her blanket after I passed out. Might as well give it to her because I'm leaving… I think I'll see if the cafeteria can be opened, maybe I can see if I can get some extra food for the weekend or something...'_

Squall got up silently, then he walked towards Rinoa's couch in about a second or two, placed the blanket on top of her huddled-up body and left to go get some bobby pins where the raven-haired girl had seemed to have left them, which in this case was on the table nearby, the one that the coffee machine was on, before leaving the room.

Upon obtaining a single bobby pin, Squall strode out of the lounge, but he took a moment to gaze at Rinoa's sleeping figure before completely exiting the room itself. A thought came to mind to further his opinion of the young girl for a few seconds.

'_I hate to admit it to myself but… she is kind of pretty, even though her optimistic personality drives me up the wall to insanity… Why am I even thinking about her? I'm going to go crazy with these stupid feeli-…err…thoughts of mine if I keep this up... Next thing I know, I'll be talking to her and everything- I have got to stop these thoughts now before I do something completely stupid…'_

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Squall made a quick stop to the water fountain mid-way to his destination, his throat was thoroughly parched and his stomach was completely empty; the last thing he'd eaten was an apple yesterday morning. He finished drinking after what seemed like a minute or two, and then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand to remove the excess droplets of water under his bottom lip.

He walked down the hallway while surveying the murky surroundings around him; the lack of light effectively changed the atmosphere completely. Squall didn't mind this change at all, in fact, he sort of enjoyed it; it matched his personality quite well. He was more worried if Rinoa wasn't fond the darkness, but judging by her actions from last night, he could tell that she didn't like the somber hallways at all. He half-guessed that she most-likely preferred cheery, bright environments. He found Rinoa to be one of those people who were easy to read mentally. However, her tendency to be tense and dependent on people in the dark was causing the stoic adolescent to contemplate pulling the alarm and getting out of here right now. Her nature and quirks were trying his patience, the brown-haired teenager was naturally a lone wolf, and she was essentially very annoying in general, yet for some unknown reason, he couldn't pull himself up to triggering the alarm.

Why?

Squall pushed these thoughts aside as he continued to amble forward in the direction of the cafeteria, yet something at the back of his head was nagging at him. It felt like there was something peculiar picking at him in his mind, as if fragments of a dormant memory were trying to surface; he stopped to think upon this, but when nothing came, so he ignored it and continued on.

'_Something's amiss. Why should there be any reason to have some kind of memory after I blacked out by the door… usually people don't remember things while they're passed out… This is not making sense at all... What am I trying to think of?'_ He pondered in revelation.

After the destination was attained, Squall picked the lock, and although he wasn't as good as Rinoa when it came to unlocking doors, he still managed to enter the unpopulated cafeteria.

The cafeteria's front counter was locked behind a possibly retractable steel grate, at one of the sides of it had a lock along with a small red button underneath of it, Squall assumed that this would allow the divider grate to open. He attempted a combination of picking at the lock then pressing the button, but it was a futile effort. Getting frustrated, he continued these motions until light footsteps behind him caused him to glance backwards in distraction for a brief moment; it was Rinoa. He barely acknowledged her presence before continuing to pick the lock once more in vain effort.

"I tried that already last night, and it doesn't work. The grate must need to use electricity in some way." Rinoa stated in a calm tone.

Squall's attempt to get the grate to open halted as he turned around to face Rinoa with his stoic gaze and with his arms folded. Rinoa mysteriously wasn't affected at all by his cold demeaning posture. In fact, she attempted to lighten the mood with a little conversation.

"So… Don't you wanna know how I saved your life?" Rinoa said jokingly, she chucked a bit afterwards.

"No."

"Well… How are you feeling then?"

"Fine, I suppose."

At the moment, Squall was feeling much better knowing that he was not letting Rinoa get to him; albeit he was a little curious to how Rinoa purged the previously-agonizing pain he had endured last night. Rinoa on the other hand, wasn't quitting until she'd crack his icy walls to force him to at least admit something, if anything at all.

She then planned to attempt to catch him off-guard eventually by changing the subject.

"So, what's on the agenda for today Squall? Anything special you want to do?" Rinoa inquired, Squall looked at her after her question, slightly perplexed.

'_Why would she want to know what I want to do?_'

"…Nothing really."

"Come on Squall, you have to think of something to do while on vacation! Think harder!" She mock-yelled at him jokingly, somehow Squall would never adjust to the idea of this predicament being a 'vacation'.

Squall started to walk out of the cafeteria while he also started to respond to her question in a cold tone to attempt to brush her off, he was getting annoyed with this constant talking, "…I'm going to look around to see if there's any other possible way out, that's it. Now can you please leave me alone, just because we're stuck inside together doesn't mean we have to be glued together."

He had started to quicken his pace a little while heading towards one of the first-floor classrooms, his first idea was to open up a window and go through to the outside. During the brisk walk, he took time to do his usual pondering.

'_Maybe I shouldn't have been so harsh towards her… Nevermind, she would have left if I hadn't done that. Whatever... Squall you have to keep your thoughts at the task at hand, not on the past… Normally you'd never do that, what's happening to you?'_

Something must have distracted him greatly because he'd forgotten the bobby pin necessary to open doors; he inwardly cursed to himself under his breath and silently returned towards the cafeteria in order to recover the abandoned pin. Squall blamed the confinement for his uncharacteristic act of neglect; however, in the depths of his mind, he knew it had to be something else.

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The cafeteria door came closer into view as he walked further down the darkened corridor. As Squall re-entered the desolate canteen, he checked for the missing bobby pin, yet was futile in his findings and his brain went to work right away, accessing the situation yet once more.

'_Where did I leave it? It should be here somewhere… It's not like it could disappear into thin ai-'_

"Looking for this, Squall?" A voice behind him inquired somewhat-mockingly, interrupting his train of thought, Squall turned around on the dime; it was Rinoa brandishing the bobby pin between her thumb and forefinger.

'_I should have known it was her... I never forget things like that, especially when they're between my fingers. Will she ever give up? I've got be more careful next time, that girl is going to be the end of me I swear…'_

"Okay… enough of this game, please give it back."

"Nope." Rinoa replied blatantly, a small smile started to curve on her lips.

Squall had enough this foolishness on her part, he made one final attempt by glaring at her in combination with a menacing, cold scowl in her direction, he then finalized the attempt with a simple demand in an low, icy tone.

"…Give it back **now.**"

Rinoa, however, wasn't fazed by this at all. Oddly enough, she still kept her chipper attitude and the small smirk on her face.

"I will- But only if you say '_Thank you'_ to me for last night."

He then started to wonder._ 'Why should he thank her for anything? Did I (or she) do something last night that I don't remember today?'_ Squall looked slightly perplexed and annoyed before retorting to her proposal.

"-And what should I thank _**you** _for exactly?"

Being somewhat aggravated, Rinoa's tone seemed a little more riled up than usual, "I saved your life Squall, you could have_ DIED _for Hyne's sake!" She paused to calm down to return to her normal state of being, coy smile and all, "Tell you what, if you listen to how I saved your life last night, I'll give you the pin. What do you say?"

Squall started to debate inside his mind, '_It won't kill you Squall, just accept. Hyne, it's better than asking what happened last night yourself. Go ahead; she's just given you an opportunity to find out without letting her think that's she's gotten to you._'

"…Fine. But first, understand one thing."

"What, Squall?" She asked sweetly.

"I'm only listening just to get that pin back, I'm personally not interested in your story at all… so don't get any ideas."

"Sure, _whatever_ _you say Squall… _In fact, I didn't even know you had a personal side to begin with." Rinoa retorted with a mix of sarcasm and humor before beginning her yarn of events. He glared at her for that remark, she just giggled at the scowl he gave her. He was so much fun to tease in her opinion.

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"Okay, last night after you had collapsed, I had gotten extremely nervous; I wasn't sure what to do at all. I panicked. Then I got so nervous that I started to pace back in forth in thought. After a few seconds or possibly minutes, I'm not sure, I got this idea, and it was to go to the infirmary to see if they had any medication on hand to possibly save you or anything that could have helped. So I ran as fast as I could to the infirmary because I couldn't bring you with me. Hyne, I ran so fast I nearly slid into lockers three times! Also, it was so dark I accidentally passed infirmary twice! Anyways, I unlocked the infirmary's door in record time, but when I went inside, I couldn't open up the medicine storage cabinet, it had one of those card swipe and PIN number battery-operated things on the cabinet's doors, so I couldn't get to any medicine at all. I was in too much of a rush to think of a way to open it. Even if I could have gotten to the medicine, I probably wouldn't have been able to read any of the bottle labels anyway, and Hyne knows you'd die from choking if I'd have tried putting a pill down your throat, let alone if I could have pried your mouth open for a change. Actually, come to think of it, that could have been fun to watch…"

Squall had thought Rinoa had stopped for a second to catch her breath for a bit after recalled a lengthy portion of her tale, but in reality, it was actually because of something else.

During this pause, and after shooting daggers at her for that last remark, he thought in horror what could have happened if she'd of gotten any medicine at her disposal and what other terror-inducing things in store for the rest of the story; he just hoped that she didn't do anything R-rated to him when he was out-cold during the remainder of the story.

"…Okay, so seeing as I couldn't get hold of any medicine, I simply went back towards the teachers' lounge to find you still unconscious, but you were a bit bluer than last time so I dragged you into the lounge, propped you onto that one couch and put that blanket over top on you since …_I-I…um…_ couldn't think of anything else, …_so…I _just kept watch to _…um…_ make sure that didn't-"

Rinoa was lying. It was dead obvious to Squall, seeing that he already knew what her speech was like when she was 'attempting' to lie. He was just about to interject to tell her to just tell the truth, no matter how weird or inappropriate it was or might have been, but Rinoa beat him to the punch herself.

"-_Actually… _Forget about that last part, I actually tried something _else_ to help save you before putting you on the sofa with the blanket, but I'm not so, _so_…_sure…_ if you want to hear about it _since_… it's sort of something that I probably shouldn't have done…"

Squall got annoyed with her insecurity, _'Why insist on telling a story if there are parts that you don't want to say?' _He had thought in response. Inside, however, he half-wanted to know what she'd done, but his other half didn't. This time, and one of the very, **very **few times, his inquisitive side won, but to mask this…feeling, he replied in a tone of voice that sounded more impatient, rather than curious.

"-Just spit it out, as long it wasn't something revolting, I don't care."

"Okay, but there's one thing I'd like to know before telling you."

"…What." Squall folded his arms in annoyance.

"Do you still feel any pain from yesterday right now?"

"…Only a dull ache above my eyes. Why would you care?"

"_Wow…you must have been in agony last night_." She murmured discreetly to herself before replying aloud to Squall.

"…Squall, how did you manage to stay on two feet with that amount of pain? …I had to use two Curaga spells on you last night before seeing a difference! You must have had exceptionally strong endurance to withstand a magnitude of suffering like that if you still have a dull ache today; with all due respect, you should have fainted a lot earlier..."

'_You'd have to thank Seifer for that.' _He quipped internally.

"…So what was the big deal about the Curaga spells?" Squall inquired as politely as he could, trying to hold the sarcasm for a change.

"Oh! _Well_… I thought that you wouldn't have liked it if I'd have told you that I broke school policy to attempt something that might have not worked… Guess I was wrong wasn't I?"

Squall mused briefly on Rinoa's display of doubt, _'Rinoa, if you would have read the school's policy on spells properly, you'd of known that curative spells are permitted in situations like those, like I'd care if you broke the policy anyways… And for that matter, why would you care what I think about you anyway…'_

"Whatever."

"Well, I suppose you want the pin back now…" She took a brief moment to fish the bobby pin out of her pocket, "Here, take it."

Squall took the make-shift lockpick out of her hand and started to head back towards his earlier destination by retreating out of the room, and then he heard her light footsteps follow him outside; although those footsteps did not follow the same direction after getting out of the cafeteria.

"Well, I'll see you later Squall. Just let me know if there's a way out, 'kay?" Rinoa said in a small trace of slight disappointment as she was heading towards the opposite corridor.

Sometimes Squall cursed upon his ability to read people so well, and this was one of those times. Obviously by her tone of voice, Rinoa wanted to join him in search for a way out, or at least to have his company in general. Normally, he would have ignored this subliminal verbal plea, but there was just something about her that he couldn't ignore. He automatically started to ponder in revelation.

'_Hmph…Maybe my mind is using some kind of subconscious logic to make sure that I don't have a completely unpleasant person to deal with for the weekend? -No, that doesn't make sense; I could just pull the alarm if that was the case… What is it that I'm experiencing? I can't believe I'm actually doing this… '_

"…You can come if you want… I don't care."

Rinoa abruptly turned around in surprise, "_Really?_ If I recall correctly, weren't you the one who had said _'just because we're stuck inside together doesn't mean we have to be glued together_'. What's with the change in heart?"

"…Well, number one, I've come to realize that you need some kind of company or else you go insane within two minutes of solitude, and number two, if I didn't let you come with me, I'd have to spend 20 minutes trying to find you anyways to tell you anything regardless. That's it."

"Are you _**sure** _it's not because of something _else? Hmm..?_" Rinoa asked jokingly with a big Cheshire grin, face tilted just below Squall's. He gave her the usual icy glare as he turned around to end all further non-sense and commenced their search for a way out.

"She'd better shut up during the search or else I'm the one who's going to go insane…" he muttered irritably underneath his breath, with Rinoa happily tailing him.

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During their search, Rinoa had surprisingly been fairly quiet apart from the several minor (and fruitless) attempts at striking up a conversation, and when she also inquired if she could help him when Squall was attempting a new possible way to escape the clutches of the school's interior. No efforts were successful at all; all of the windows were permanently sealed (or too high up for non-suicidal escape), no unguarded doors were unlocked/lockpick-able, and the other outside doors were alarm-protected. By the time the pair were finished searching, it was around 4:30, and their always-searching, anorexic-like eating habits were finally catching up with them, so naturally, they decided to head towards Rinoa's locker, where they consequently kept all of the food, and ate the day's pre-planned rations, not to mention a stop at the old water fountain to keep their hunger at bay. At least for a little while anyway.

Afterwards, they, or rather Squall with Rinoa following him, went in the direction of the other school-incarcerated teen's (Squall's) locker. There, the owner of that particular locker started to gather up his Revolver case, his gym bag which contained another set of non-stained gym clothes and started a trek to the gym in a steady, even pace while the other captive was left a bit bewildered while trying to catch up.

"Hey, what exactly are you doing Squall?"

Being annoyed, Squall replied coldly, "…What does it look like I'm doing?"

"Well, shouldn't you care about what _**I** am_ supposed to do while you're practicing your brains out?" The Revolver case-carrying adolescent chose to ignore this remark and simply continued on his march to the gym.

As the doors to gym came into the view, Squall quickened his pace a bit; he was itching to practice his gunblade techniques all day regardless if he were to practice in his basement if he got out- or the gym if he couldn't. Seeing as they couldn't get out, it was clearly the latter.

When they were inside the somber gym, while Squall headed towards the guys' locker room, Rinoa took a seat on a gym bench, most likely to rest her feet for she and Squall had been walking nearly all day. But right before completely retreating into the change room, Squall noticed out of the far corner of his eye, a deviant smirk spreading across Rinoa's face. Then he hoped that she wasn't planning anything sinister in store for him.

Changing took a little longer than usual, the lack of lighting made the task of picking the clean set of gym clothes rather than the blood-stained ones and bit more troublesome, but despite this waste of a several minutes, Rinoa didn't barge in to catch him half-dressed like he had assumed she'd do, judging from of the sly smile she had plastered on her face whilst sitting on the bench.

As he exited the room, Squall didn't see Rinoa on the bench like she was located before, or anywhere for that matter, but roughly two seconds later, she popped out of the girls' locker room with her set of gym clothes on, and her Pinwheel attached on her right forearm, grin forming on her lips as soon as she saw Squall at the opposing side of the gym, he thought nothing of it as he caught a glance at the smiling Heartilly. Unbeknownst to him, she had a plan - a plan ready for action.

Squall started to practice as if she didn't even exist, but stopped as soon as Rinoa got in his way. Being thoroughly annoyed, Squall tried to drive her away so that he could to the only thing he actually felt like doing on his 'vacation'.

"Can you please move…"

"No, I was kind of hoping that we could practice together, if that's okay with you."

Squall contemplated Rinoa's offer, _'She must have something up her sleeve, there's something unsettling about the way she was smirking earlier, I can't help but not at least have the suspicion that she's got ulterior motives planned already…'_

'_-The practice can't hurt though, it's better than practicing alone… I'll just ignore any opportunities for conversation that she attempts, that's all…'_

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Dueling with Rinoa was a lot different from dueling with Seifer, it wasn't that it was harder or easier, Squall had just realized that the battle mechanics for fighting against projectiles were a lot different from the methods for facing another gunblade or any blade weapon, and so he found it a bit more challenging to adapt to in such a small period of time. He secretly was enjoying the change of pace that this practice was providing; even though he was determined not to show it.

Rinoa on the other hand, wasn't getting as much fun out of this as Squall secretly was. She was determined to get a conversation going while dueling, yet Squall's level of intensity in practice wasn't enabling her that opportunity. Instead, the she was giving 110 percent on trying to focus to fend off his blade so that he could not win. She saw a victory as a possibility that Squall could use to utilize as an excuse to go Hyne-knows where alone by himself. She did have to admit that he was actually improving her skills though, but still, that was not her intention at all. Not by a long shot.

During the course of the duel, Squall was noticing a decline of effort in Rinoa's techniques, albeit they provided nearly the same effectiveness, he generally assumed that she was getting bored of the general repetitiveness of the duel as a whole, which caused him to form a smart-alecky remark inside his head.

'_You got what you asked for Rinoa, I'm not here to feebly practice and chat at the same time, I'm here to duel whether you like it or not.'_

However, he soon changed his analysis of Rinoa's predicted present state very swiftly.

While looking up at her for a moment, her current appearance gave the gunblade-wielder an impression that she was going to collapse from exhaustion any minute now, so in light of this, he inwardly considered that he should be kind enough to stop in order to avoid any complications later on. But the thing that surprised him the most was the fact that she didn't say anything about stopping herself, this got him to thinking that maybe she really was _that_ determined to practice to improve her skills or… that she really was _that_ determined to practice to squeak in some conversation at one point or another. Either option was legitimate, but after thinking over once more, Squall realized that she clearly had 'Option B' in her head.

'_Rinoa, won't you **ever** give up? It's doesn't matter though, nothing will ever work anyways because I'll be one step ahead of you every time. Maybe I'll make this into game… Maybe not, that's too cruel for anyone to endure.'_

Squall had dropped his attacks after he had delivered one last counter with his blade for what probably could have been the hundredth time, yet Rinoa took notice of this a little too late and ended up hitting Squall in the stomach with the Pinwheel's projectile. She gasped as he doubled over slightly and extended his left hand forward to let her know to stop dueling.

"Are you okay Squall!" She yelped loudly.

He then proceeded to scold himself mentally,_ 'Smart move Leonhart, maybe you should have said something instead… Now she'll be worried and shower you with a pointless rain of 'SORRY! SORRY! SORRY!'… Sometimes you should open your mouth more…'_

"…I'm fine."

"Phew…That's good…_although I_ still feel a bit faint… –_Hey_, why did we stop?" Rinoa wondered aloud.

"…Because you didn't look too good…I didn't want you fainting or anything."

"Oh, thanks… _-Wait a minute,_ since when do you care about me anyway? …Got some other unsaid thoughts in your head that you'd like to share, _hmmm…_" Rinoa said suggestively, trying to corner Squall into forcibly admitting something. However, Squall already had a response to get out of that trap already.

"…No, I just don't feel like dragging a body all the way to the staff lounge today." He honestly retorted rather dismissively.

"…Very funny, Squall, I never thought you were capable of making a joke. But still, I'm not feeling the greatest, so I'd like to get to that couch before I pass out. Hyne knows where I'll end up if I faint and need your help." Rinoa quipped wearily with a bit of venom in her voice; she couldn't believe that he got out of that one.

'_That's funny, I wasn't even joking…'_

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When Rinoa made it to one of the lounge's sofas without any complications at all, she decided to take a nap. Meanwhile when he knew that she'd finally had fallen asleep, Squall headed back towards the gym yet again. Not for practice purposes like he'd previously had done before, but to try to distract some of the hunger pains he was having by planning to do a little workout of sit-ups, push-ups and various things. For some reason it usually worked for him when he was at home alone waiting for his father to come home for a very late supper.

On his way to the gym, Squall checked under his gym shirt to see if there was any bruise or anything caused by the Pinwheel attack. He only found a small gash along with a bit of minor bleeding on his abdomen and a small blood stain on the inside of his t-shirt, although it didn't stain on the outside. Squall would have checked sooner, but Rinoa was also present, he didn't feel like being worried about over what was only a mild discomfort to him.

When he finally got to the gym and went upstairs to the weights room, Squall then proceeded to do what he had intended on doing on the mats, and his plan was working for awhile, but there was something else that was slightly impeding his progress as his mind came up for a substitute for those hunger pains that he was experiencing earlier, and those were thoughts from his mind about today, and particularly on the person whom he'd spent today with.

'_Why is she so desperate to make conversation with me?-'_

Sit-up.

'_-Why doesn't she just leave me alone?-'_

Sit-up again.

'-_Why exactly didn't she ask to stop in practice?-_'

Sit-up once more.

'_-Why is she even on my mind anyway?'_

Get up.

Squall tried to assimilate these new bothersome questions in his head by switching to push-ups with ease. He assumed that since he was getting used to the continuous burn of sit-ups, it enabled his brain to wander elsewhere and formulate questions in his head, and for the moment, was right with his prior hypothesis.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Squall, a silent observer had taken up residence outside, near the weight room's door, peering through the window beside the door with guilty fascination at his working figure.

"_Wow… I didn't know he was that fit… But there's so much I don't know about him…_" Rinoa, the silent observer muttered to herself in awe, which by chance, freshly awoke from her nap. She still wasn't back to 100 percent, but she couldn't make herself sleep anymore anyways, so, she went to find Squall.

She looked on for at least 10 minutes; she was fascinated with how he managed to work arduously in a continuous manner in light of their situation and after the conditions which they both subjected themselves all day in search and practice. It kind of made Rinoa pity her own physical capabilities and endurance for a moment or two. But most of the moments she'd spent gazing at him from afar made Rinoa continuously wish that Squall would take off his T-shirt, but from what she'd knew about him, she fully realized that her wish was just as good as being a pipe dream (A/N – I couldn't resist writing that in…lol!).

However, she stopped making guilty wishes at she saw him stop momentarily to clutch his sides, she guessed that he was experiencing pain from either his stomach or possibly his head and felt badly for him, wishing that she could have helped him through the hurt, but she knew that she couldn't do any thing about it.

"_I wish that I could help, but I can't. I just feel like…-I feel like your pain is all my fault…Sorry."_

And that's when Rinoa decided to leave, she couldn't bear seeing him like this or to get caught peeking at him, and besides, she had to go the bathroom anyway.

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Squall's hunger, mental and head pains seemed to have all come back all at one precise moment, as if the three pains were conspiring to make him writhe in suffering, but despite the intense moment they all strangely left quick enough.

After the pain had seemed to have departed, Squall mused briefly._ 'Maybe I should finally stop and take a shower; I think I'm thoroughly done for the night.'_

He went downstairs in haste, not even bothering to halt for a split second to his destination to the guys' locker room, and meanwhile just blatantly removed his sweaty shirt as he just before got inside the locker room itself, he didn't feel like wasting any time, he felt dog-gone tired and felt like getting the inevitable icy-cold shower (no electricity equals no heat) out of the way and go Hyne-knows where to crash for the night.

After what felt like the shortest, and most-coldest, shower of his life, the adolescent walked swiftly the staff lounge, where he found a sitting Rinoa, doing what seemed to be like homework of some sort.

Once she caught a glimpse of him in her sight, her attention diverted from her schoolwork to him, giving him an odd smirk.

"Where did you go to, a water park?" Rinoa said while keeping a nearly-straight face.

"…No."

"Squall, you do realize that I was joking, right?"

Squall didn't reply right away, he just made a mental retort,_ 'Of course I do Rinoa, I'm not stupid, I just don't partake in imbecilic jokes.'_

"…Whatever, I'm going to bed."

Afterwards, Squall almost instantaneously fell asleep on the same couch he found himself on this morning, but right before going unconscious in sleep, he thought he had heard Rinoa say something along the lines of, '_By the way Squall, nice back._' but he ignored it, figuring that he was probably imagining things.

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**End of Chapter Comments –** Sorry in advance if this chapter wasn't as good as the other two, but I swear that the next chapter posted will be up much, **much** sooner and might possibly be better in terms of stuff happening to Squall and Rinoa. Also, before I forget, sorry if you guys didn't like the bits of humour that I added in this chapter.

So until next time (whenever _that_ may be), keep reviewing with ideas, comments or anything you guys have to say! Thanks!


	4. Chapter IV – Unwanted Intrusions

**Author's Note – **Sorry for the unforgivably-late chapter, this semester at school was horrible for giving me way too much homework…Anyways, I'd like to share other than the fact that I'm yet again pleased with the positive reviews/threats I've gotten (At least they still want to read this fic…) and that I've finally gotten some constructive criticism in some of those reviews, because if I'm not told things, I will not improve. Also, expect more timely additions from here on in because I finally on summer vacation, so that means more free time! Sorry about before, I seem to get worse and worse for updating…

Okay, enough of my rambling… On to those reviews!

**Responses to reviews for Chapter 3**

_FloralBlackMoon_ – Thanks for review! It makes me **so **happy to know when people say that they like my fic to **that** extent. _I'm so happy…_ -_author starts rambling insanely in corner-_

_lady-rinoa_ – Thank you so much for giving your honest opinion and ideas for the fic, I appreciate the criticism greatly. As for your suggestions, I **will** make Rinoa less childish (so bear with me for the transition) and she won't bug Squall nowhere near as much, and then we'll see about Squall's reaction to that then... Hee…

…And just to let you know, there was a reason why Squall doesn't want to open up, but I might not write that until a bit later, sometimes I'm not completely sure about certain things, and that's one of those things. Sorry.

_DBZ Fanfiction Queen _– Thanks for the review, and I hope that Adel forgot about my extreme late-ness because I don't want her after my blood… Lol…

…Okay, if I may be serious for a moment, to answer your question, Squall wasn't sleeping shirtless, and I'll clarify to what I was implying by Rinoa's ending comment in Chapter 3. Rinoa saw Squall's backside when he was going inside the guys' locker room because Rinoa, at the time, had just came out of the bathroom before, so when he was going in, she came out of the girls' locker room.

So, to really get the joke, you had to read between the lines, or that I just have to learn to write fanfiction better.

_Luissquall _– I'm glad that you didn't mind my laziness and that you enjoyed the chapter!

_Heartillyangel_ – Thank you very much for your review, and I hope that you'll like this chapter as well.

_Silver-nex_ **x2** – Glad someone found that last chapter funny. / I'm so sorry… sorry…sorry!

tidusXyuna637 – Thanks, and I hope that this update is as good as the last.

Okay, might as well get on to writing this Hyne-forsaken chapter since I'm done to responding to reviews, here we go!

**_-Author types insanely fast-_**

_**Edit (07/07/06) – **Just fixed some typos and tweaked a particular scene due to problems._

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**Chapter IV – Unwanted Intrusions **

"**_Why aren't they back yet, it's already very, VERY dark outside!" _**

_**A phone was put back onto its' receiver.**_

"**_I'm sorry, but they won't be coming back…Um… you see- "_**

"**_-Why?" _**

"**_Well, it's like this……"_**

Beams of light peeked through the lounge window yet again, achieving to catch a certain seventeen-year old male captive's range of vision. This caused him to rouse from his slumber to face the new day, a day that he'd rather not experience if he were to be given the choice.

Unfortunately, since he did not possess the super-natural talent of time manipulation, he did not have a say in the matter. Instead, he opted to think about the matter.

'_Tonight, I'm going to sleep in the infirmary… I dislike always having this stupid sunlight in my eyes; it always makes me wake up much too early… '_ Squall thought groggily while attempting to sit up on the sofa.

After rubbing away sleep from his eyes, he swiftly scanned the room for a possible working clock to obviously to distinguish whether it was early or **too** early in the morning. He walked around the lounge quietly, Rinoa was still sleeping on the other couch, but to no avail, all two of the clocks he found were plugged to powerless outlets. But then something clicked inside Squall's head, reminding him of something.

'…_I think Rinoa has a watch… I'm almost positive that she recited the time at least once yesterday, I guess there's only one way to find out…'_

Rinoa indeed had a watch on her left forearm, confirming his prior inclinations, but Squall soon found out that he'd have difficulty in reading the time, because that arm happened to be dangling over the couch's side, poking out from under her blanket-covered form, with the watch's face facing the floor.

Ever so cautiously, he tried to pick up the limp arm to attempt reading the current time, however by coincidence, just about the same time Squall almost had the time at his disposal for reading, Rinoa's arm subconsciously did not feel like cooperating with him. It decided to retract under the blanket's depths, and Squall just got more frustrated with the situation itself.

'_She's the only person who I have ever met that's a nuisance both to me when they're awake and asleep! …Might as well try once more before giving up, at least this is killing a bit of time…'_

In a final attempt, Squall lifted the pallid make-shift cover, and the watch-bearing arm became visible, bent against Rinoa herself, wedged between her head and curled-up legs possibly for warmth purposes, he then moved to get a better angle to see and actually managed to read the time.

7:32 it read.

Squall's mind automatically started to ponder, _'Hmm… Not bad, I sup-'_

"…_Huh… -Hey!_ What are you _doing?_" Rinoa exclaimed as her eyelids fluttered open, meanwhile Squall clattered to the floor in surprise.

"-Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you!" She pleaded as she sprang to help him get up.

"…I'm fine, just startled…That's all…" The blue-eyed teen replied briefly while doing his best to get up with a bit of grace while brushing off the attempt of help given by the previously-sleeping girl.

"That's a relief… what were you trying to do Squall?"

"…Just trying to read the time on your watch…The other clocks weren't working." Squall stated in a no-nonsense tone of voice, he was certain that Rinoa wouldn't be able to find anything weird in that sentence to bug him about, he didn't feel like her antics this early in the morning, especially when he could have been sleeping if the moronic sunlight hadn't woken him up.

"That makes sense, clocks need electricity to run, but why would you want to know the time? I mean, I don't think that it'd be necessary in our predicament."

'_You know, she might be right about that one, but why can't she stop trying to figure me out... Hyne, can't I even do one thing without her analyzing the reasoning behind it, and today I just want to be left ALONE and not bothered...'_

"…Rinoa, can you please stop judging whatever stupid thing I do and just leave me be? I'm getting sick of it. I only wanted to know the time because the sunlight woke me up, that's all…"

Rinoa was a bit shocked by his angry retort because she wasn't expecting him to say something like **that** so early in the morning, usually somebody would need to be fully awake before saying something like…_Wait a minute,_ didn't it seem like what he had said was actually what he happened to be thinking about? Had she at last gotten through his defenses? Or was this a slip because he wasn't fully awake? Only one thing was certain and that it was that Squall Leonhart, the self-proclaimed lone wolf had finally shown traces of humanity and that he did show some level of emotion, even though the ones being articulated happened to be anger and annoyance at the moment.

"Oh, I'm sorry about that, I didn't intend for my question to be like that, it just seemed a bit... you know, odd."

Squall suddenly realized in full effect what he had just said. Had Rinoa finally gotten to him? And did he just confess to what he was actually thinking, and to what he was… _feeling? _Squall was unsure to any of this at all, he was caught on the fence because he couldn't decide to whether he only said that because it was so early in morning or that in reality, Rinoa had finally achieved to make him admit something, albeit accidentally. Only one thing he did know was that it sickened him to know that fact and that she'd won and neither of them had even realized it until moments later.

'_What have I done? She actually got me to admit something without even TRYING! Maybe, it was a momentary lapse… Yeah, that's got to be it… after all, I don't think that I'm really awake yet, but was that the reason? Or is it an excuse? I can't believe that I actually did that… If she tries that again- it'll be the **last** straw. I'll leave, I… can't… **I won't** take this anymore… Sorry E-"_

"…Squall, are you okay? You look a little pale." Rinoa wondered aloud, at that moment he realized that he went into a bit of trance a couple of seconds beforehand.

"…_Um-_Yeah, I'm fine." As if it where trying to mock him, a small trickle of a faint, stinging sensation was beginning to feel it's presence known on Squall's scar yet once more.

'_Does this thing have a mind of its own? The pain always seems to act up only at the worst times possible… Maybe this'll teach me a lesson for letting my ego get the best of me…But why do the lessons always have to be so Hyne-forsaken painful all of the time?'_

"Phew, that's good. So… since I don't think that we have anything planned, I was sort of wondering, would you like to spar with me again? You seemed to like it yesterday, so I thought that it might be fun to do it again."

'_How did she know that I liked it? -Am I losing my touch? Better brush it off for later. I don't want to be figured out that easily...'_

"…Maybe later, I really don't feel like it now."

"Oh, okay…"

The sunlight shining through the windows had seemingly been getting stronger by the minute, and Squall was getting sick of it, that and the thought of Rinoa getting to him. A part of him wished once more that this morning had never come to be and it was tormenting his mind to know that there could be nothing to be done about it, but for some reason today, his body felt was also feeling tormented as well. Squall was pretty certain that he was actually feeling tired, which was another first for him, just another exception to be added to his normal behavior. Maybe a nap in the infirmary would to him good, after all, he hadn't been eating properly in the last couple of days and this would give him an escape from Rinoa's random bantering.

So at that moment, he started walking to the infirmary without saying a single word, and oddly enough, the raven-haired girl wasn't following him or asking him a million questions a minute, the weary-eyed Leonhart was starting to think that maybe, just maybe, she was finally getting the picture and that she was starting to realize that he didn't want a companion at his side every waking minute of the day.

After opening the infirmary's already-unlocked door, Squall went inside the somber room and found himself a nice clean bed and laid down on its soft, but firm, white mattress. Sleep came easily enough within a matter of a couple of minutes, but a small multitude of thought permeated his head right before falling into slumber's sweet, cleansing depths.

'_Why didn't Rinoa follow me? I was almost certain that she'd ask me at least one question after I left…' _

'_Can it be possible that she might have gotten the message?' _

'_I don't think people change that quickly…'_

'… _Why is this even bothering me, shouldn't I be trying to …sle..e.p… '_

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"**_-they won't be coming back…Um… you see- "_**

"**_-Why?" _**

"**_Well, it's like this… they got into… a car accident-"_**

"**_What's a car ac-ac..cid…dent Daddy?"_**

"**_It's when two cars crash into each other, sorta like what you do to your toy cars sometimes… a-and, I can't really explain it to you right now… It's just too hard."_**

"**_It's not hard Daddy, I can understand, I'm 5 years old and that's big!"_**

"…**_Maybe I'll explain it when you're older, then you'll understand…"_**

After a having what seemed like a fragment of a dream, Squall woke up and found himself the exact same bed, in the exact same position right before he'd fallen asleep, exact same everything…that is, unless if he hadn't seen Rinoa on the bed adjacent to him, just like Seifer had been a few days prior, however this didn't surprise the teenager one bit.

"I suppose some things don't change after all…" He muttered to himself while trying to get up, but somehow he knew deep inside that Rinoa wouldn't leave him be after all. However, in reality, this was far from the case.

As Squall was silently trying to exit the room, trying not to wake the slumbering Heartilly for the second time, he heard an odd clattering noise, causing him to abruptly turn around. It was Rinoa that had fallen out of her bed.

"…Oww."

Squall had turned around split-seconds right after to see Rinoa fall down onto the floor, and when she came out of her sleep-induced reverie, it looked as if she was having a bit of trouble getting up on her own accord. His primary instinct was to leave her to get up by herself, but another thought emerged and it told him to help her, being caught on what action to do, he thought about it for maybe a fraction of a second.

'_Somehow, I know that I'll regret doing this but-'_

After an interval of a few seconds, Squall swiftly aided Rinoa to get back on her own bed and let her go back to her own devices as fast as humanly possible. Whatever they might have been, Squall didn't care as long as she'd leave him alone. After leaving the nearly-vacant room, he came to the conclusion that he did make a good decision in helping her since she seemed to be half-asleep, therefore couldn't possibly hold it against him. Somehow Squall was starting to get a little annoyed with himself; reason being that he kept on getting increasingly paranoid about Rinoa and the way she subconsciously seemed to make his notions revolve her with just about… everything she did. Why was this happening to him? And for that matter, why should he even be caring about this?

In attempt to ditch the continuous, plaguing reflections, Squall decided on taking a long walk of the school's interior, maybe it would do him some good to clear his mind and pass some time.

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The walk had done wonders for the previously-troubled adolescent's complex mindset, now the only torment he seemed to have were the occasional pangs of hunger spasms from the lack of nourishment, figuring that it appeared to be an appropriate time to share the day's rations, Squall walked in the direction towards the infirmary in hopes of meeting up with Rinoa to inform her about what he was planning on doing. They had previously agreed to tell each other when they were having any food just to keep tabs.

When he re-entered the room, he appeared to be in good luck, Rinoa was still sleeping soundly on her bed, unbeknownst of everything surrounding her, Squall figured that he should wait until she woke up, just to be polite and not disrupt her slumber. Instead, he backtracked to his locker and opted to start some history homework assigned a day before their quiz.

Squall however, couldn't seem to concentrate, whether it was constant rumbling of his stomach reminding him of his hunger or just general thoughts drifting in and out, his mind could not stay focused on Hyne, wars, or whatever the hell he was supposed to be writing about, and for some reason he kept on having a continuous notion that something was wrong somewhere. Squall was actually on ball for that; that something somewhere seemed to be a certain someone sleeping in the infirmary, not that he knew that much.

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Meanwhile in the infirmary, saying that Rinoa wasn't very well the greatest was a bit of an understatement; she felt drained, which probably the worse feeling she'd like to experience at any given moment, add a few nightmares and guilt trips and you'd know exactly how she was feeling (provided that you're a very perky and optimistic individual).

She hated every moment of this lethargy; not having any energy was horrible for starters, Rinoa felt as if all she could do was sleep, she couldn't even get herself up after falling out of bed for _Hyne-sake_! _No…_ she **had **to be helped back onto the bed by someone else (_Squall?_), to what, _sleep some more?_ Being helpless and weak was extremely unlike herself in her own opinion, on top of that, she felt bad for Squall; had she'd been too _forward_ with him? Dissecting his every sentence… word…pauses for hidden meanings of interest? Now that she was fully aware of her actions by his minor outburst earlier this morning, Rinoa finally realized that trying directly to get to know Squall Leonhart was not the best (or easiest) route to follow as once thought.

Awoken again from her slumber, still exhausted, she got up. Rinoa may have gone a little too fast maybe, because she tripped out of bed instead of getting out of bed.

"Tired or not, I'm getting out of here!" She declared, still fighting the fatigue which was plaguing her.

She exited the room and turned around a couple corners, but halted suddenly, surprised to see Squall trying to do his homework.

"…_Approximatly.. 4000 years ago… Cetra civilization forms… _Nevermind…" He mumbled to himself while looking at his textbook and putting his pencil down.

"Can't do your homework?" Rinoa asked, walking up to him slowly. Squall gave her a _'what-does-it-look-like-to-you?_' glare in response.

"…If you're here to bug me some more, leave me be." He retorted coldly to his history book.

"…No, I just know how it feels when you try to do homework but can't because it's too boring, that's all."

"…Whatever…" Squall paused for a moment, remembering what he wanted to tell Rinoa when she'd been asleep.

He got up, picked his things and said, "…I'm going to have my rations for today, just so you know."

Squall was heading towards his locker when Rinoa piped up and said, "You do realize that the rations are in my locker, right?"

'_Crap…'_

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The two teens had made the trip to Rinoa's locker very silently, so silent that a pin could drop and make an unholy racket in comparison. However, Squall did notice the change in both Rinoa's social and physical behavior; she seemed eerily quiet, her gait was noticeably slower and she was as white as a sheet.

'_I wonder why she's so… different and sickly… Why am I even complaining about this? Well the sick part I can understand, I don't want to drag her around, but why am I questioning the silence? What's this I'm experiencing? Is it that I'm getting used to the annoying topics? Am I going insane? I'll have to think about this later… _'

"Here we are, I guess I'll take my rations out too I suppose." Rinoa said, justifying her actions accordingly.

She began taking out the food but had a bit of difficulty standing straight up, Squall immediately knew why she looked so weary; she needed more food in her system.

'_She looks like she's going to pass out soon, better give her my share or else I'll have to carry her to the infirmary myself… Hope she doesn't look into this…_'

"…Rinoa."

"Hmm?"

"Take my share… you don't look…very well."

"No, it's okay, it'll pass." She said, trying to hand him his rations. However, Squall refused the food in her outstretched hand.

"Trust me on this one, you need it."

"Are you sure?" Squall nodded.

"Thanks." Rinoa then sat and ate her lunch in dignified silence, slowly but surely, colour began to return to her face. After she was done she resumed talking again.

"Are you going to be okay for today Squall?"

"…Yeah. I'm used to this kind of thing happening."

"You _starve_ at home?"

"No. Sometimes I have to wait for my father to come home from late meetings to have supper." He stated in a flat tone.

"Why couldn't you just eat by yourself instead of waiting for him?" She asked.

"He's… very quirky about things like that. That's all."

"…Or is that just code for _'Squall Leonhart can't cook food for himself at all'_?" Rinoa giggled jokingly, Squall gave her a _Mega Death 3000©_ glare for that remark.

As soon as the one-sided laugh fest ended, the non-laugher decided to leave and take a walk by himself; and it just so happened that he was starting to experience another one of those migraines again.

'_What's the trigger causing these headaches so sporadically? Is it anger? Frustration? -No, then I would have them all the time… What **is** it?-'_

Just then, Squall could ponder no more as the ache intensified, and his body on the verge of collapse again, nearly identical to the pain's paramount on Friday night, yet escalating faster making it all the more excruciatingly atrocious.

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Later that day, Rinoa was roaming around aimlessly to pass time; she started to know where the various alarms, graffiti and useless junk were all situated in the school. Wandering the corridors was boring, yes, but it felt great to have her vigor restored to its prior levels.

Being completely by herself wasn't very enjoyable either, being used to her circle of friends and whatnot, but if Squall could do it 24/7 voluntarily, Rinoa figured that she could too.

"It's a shame I couldn't get to know him as well as I would have liked, maybe I can try later." She thought aloud to herself in renewed confidence. Two minutes later, she approached the end of another corridor, ready to make a right turn; but something else caught her sights first.

"Oh my god! **_Squall!_**" Rinoa's pace quickened, heart beating faster instantaneously. Squall was nearly on the floor trying to regain his posture, failing miserably at doing so; he was desperately clinging onto the wall for support.

"Squall, let me help you, I'll-" He interrupted her savior speech glaring at her from menacing eyes, one hand motioning her to stop talking.

"…You will do nothing, I'll be fine… this **will** pass."

"No it won't. You should be on medication for that gash, but since we're not in any position to give you any meds, so you **will** listen to me and let me help you." Rinoa said defiantly; clearly this was forming into a battle of wills.

'_I won't listen, I can handle this… I'm not going to fail…_'

Trying to stand on his own accord, Squall finally collapsed and clattered to the floor, but being the strong-willed person that he was, he got up slowly and started to stagger towards the infirmary, ignoring Rinoa's pleas to help him. Reluctantly, she seemingly gave up as she stormed down the other corridor to continue whatever it was she was doing very angrily.

Without her help, Squall somehow managed to make it. Once inside, he locked the door to make sure that she'd have difficulty getting in. He was going to brave it alone, with no one's help. The teen intended on keeping the promise he'd made to himself years ago; not to rely on anyone for anything. Soon, he fell into very uneasy sleep.

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"…**_Maybe I'll explain it when you're older, then you'll understand…"_**

"**_NO! I wanna know now Daddy!"_**

"…**_Okay, but it's not very happy news, are you sure you want to hear it Squall?"_**

"**_Yup, I'm ready! I'll even sit down like a good boy!"_**

"'**_Kay…Sigh… You know how your sister Ellone and Mommy went to get some fresh strawberries so that we could make jam tonight?"_**

"**_Yeah, Mommy said I get to help make jam too!"_**

"**_We.ll…After they got the strawberries, there was…another car a..nd…"_**

"**_-And big car crash, Daddy?"_**

"……**_.Yes…."_**

"**_When are they coming home then?"_**

"**_No, Squall, they're not coming home…They're gone…Your Mommy and sister..are gone, okay? They… died…"_**

"**_NO! I saw Sis and Mommy at supper, they're alive! It's too early! You only die when you're old Daddy!"_**

"**_No, Squall, they really died in the car crash… I'm so sorry…"_**

"**_But… Ellone was my big Sis..she was my fwend…I never want to have anymore fwends again, I don't want my fwends to die-"_**

"**_Don't worry Squall, everything will be alright…"_**

"**_No…never..I won't let it…"_**

Squall jolted out of his bed very agitated. That same nightmare about his mother and sister's death was plaguing him all day today and it hasn't stopped yet; trying to get his mind off things, he decided on practicing techniques again. Gunblading had always his escape, diversion from pain, thought and feeling. First, he had to get off this weird note off his shoe.

_I know that you didn't want any help, but I didn't want you dying in midst of sleeping, you were twitching an awful lot. I only cast one cure spell, if you can still feel pain that's your problem. See you in the gym._

_- Rinoa_

'_How did she know? Whatever, I'll just do as I planned, ignore her if I have to.' _The pain was still there- but to a lesser extent. Regardless, he hopped out of bed and headed towards the gym.

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Right before getting to the gym doors, Squall spotted Rinoa unnaturally nervous. At the same moment his headache seemed to force its' presence to be known again, but she wasn't the only reason why the pain was possibly perking up again. Unknown footsteps were echoing behind them. Fast.

"Well, well, look who we have here, Leonhart and Heartilly. Finally hit puberty yet Squall?"

It was Seifer accompanied by his two others that Squall knew as Seifer's 'posse', Fujin and Raijin. Rinoa must have had the same primary response to the three's presence because she voiced what Squall was thinking.

"_What the **heck** are you guys doing here!" _Rinoa yelled in shock, not expecting to find anyone but herself and Squall for the duration of their imprisonment.

"I could say the same to you, but I have a pretty good idea already." Seifer sneered. At that moment, the cobalt-eyed teenager noticed the identical gash across his rival's forehead and wondered if he was also experiencing the same pains too.

"Yeah, me too ya know?"

"SILENCE!"

"Oww… Why didja hit me for!" Raijin whined after Fujin hit him.

"Okay enough of this, if you guys got in, that means that there's a way out… Could you guys tell us how to get out?" Rinoa pleaded to Seifer.

"Had enough fun already? Nah…I don't think so."

"Please! I beg of you!"

"Why should I bother helping _you_? _However…_"

Finally, Squall entered the conversation, "…However _what?_"

"How about we duel, a rematch you might say. If you can win, I'll tell you; if not…I'll leave you to have your …_fun_ here."

"…Fine."

'_It's obvious that Seifer's only doing this for revenge, it's too obvious. I just hope this ends well…'_

Once in the gym, both Squall and Seifer stood at their respective ends ready to duel with their Gunblades when something suddenly sparked in Rinoa's brain.

"_I still don't get it. What did Seifer come here for? Wait a minute! He must have known… …No wonder he brought his Gunblade with him… Oh my Hyne…"_ Rinoa mumbled to herself, aware of the situation in its' full magnitude. Just then she looked up and saw Squall ganged up on 3-on-1 by the aid of Fujin and Raijin. Not in a traditional sense though, they only seemed to be serving as some kind of human barrier to prevent him from going very far, occasionally using their weapons to force Squall to go closer towards the blonde, strangely effective in minimizing the space he had been away from Seifer. Squall was still maintaining himself somehow- but just barely. Rinoa skid into the locker room to find her Pinwheel and help him.

By the time she got back out, Squall was still fighting back a little less effectively, all though Raijin was out cold momentarily. Squall looked very drained with several minor cuts and blood running down his sides, beads of perspiration collecting on his forehead. Figuring that there was no time to waste, Rinoa rushed to join the fray and help. Losing was not an option, but at least if she could stop the fight, it'd be all worth it.

When she got there, Squall was dodging an assault of projectiles and blade swipes, narrowly escaping each movement, every disk shot. Rinoa figured that distracting Seifer would be her best bet to ensure Squall's survival. She delivered a Pinwheel attack to Seifer's lower lip causing him to jump slightly in disbelief that he was actually bleeding in slight hurt from an unknown attacker; this gave Squall a chance to gain a bit of leverage to regain equality in the previous unfair scenario.

However this move caught Squall off-guard too as he suddenly realized Rinoa was fighting alongside him, even… _helping_ him…

"…What are _you _doing?" Squall speculated in between a parry.

"Keeping it even." She replied coolly while dodging.

In a moment later, Raijin came out of his daze and suddenly got back up. Seeing how his friends were now occupying both adversaries since Fuijin was now fending off Rinoa, he seized the opportunity and made Squall trip forward using his staff behind him; the sudden movement caused him to drop his weapon and hit his head against the gym floor.

Trying to get back up as fast as he could was extremely difficult for Squall; it was like pressing to do 10 more push-ups when you've already done 1000. Scrambling back to his feet was extremely painful too but he managed to do it because of his desire not to give in or fail. When he just got back up, he was knocked back down again. Not by the pain or suffering, but by Seifer's blade.

'…_I ..c…an't fail…I mustn't give up…'_

"...Seifer. No more... Please? Can't you see that he's had _enough?_" Rinoa implored, trying to stop the fight.

"…Don't speak for me…I'm fine." Squall interjected as he was getting up for the second time, notably slower this time round, glaring at Seifer acidly through his own blood.

"Squall, you're pitiful. You aren't worth fighting right now. You're not even taking your _girlfriend's _excuse to back out. You're not thinking straight Puberty Boy, I'm leaving. C'mon guys." That just achieved to make Squall even angrier than before, whether it was the _'girlfriend'_ part or the fact that he was saying that he unworthy to duel. In his mind this was just as bad as failure, or possibly worse.

When he finally stood up straight with a bit of Rinoa's unwanted help, Seifer and the others had already left.

"I'll try and see how they get out without getting spotted, I'll be back soon." Squall nodded.

She then exited the gym with caution, wary of the task of following Seifer and the others without being seen. Closely following their trail, Rinoa went down the full length of the corridor, and then as they turned right, she cautiously approached the corner listening for footsteps coming back or anything suspicious. When all sounded alright to continue tracking them again, Rinoa rounded the bend to resume pursuit.

…Or she would have if she didn't crash into Seifer himself.

"You're all too predictable Rinoa, you know that?" He said with a smirk on his face.

"I don't care Seifer."

"Well if you're so hell-bent on escaping this dump, I've got an idea."

"Then what is it?" Rinoa asked tiredly.

"I'll let you escape with us if you'll go out with me again."

"No, that was ages ago; I couldn't go out with you now! Besides, I couldn't just leave Squall like that! That's horrible!"

"Fine, it's your loss. Don't bother following, from the way we came, you'd need help getting out and I'm sure as hell not in the mood to lend a hand."

"Wouldn't have it any other way."

"By the way," Seifer paused, breaking out in a malicious grin, "did ever tell Puberty Boy about what you _did_ Friday afternoon?"

"No. No I didn't, but _how-_"

"-Lets' just say I have connections, some people talk you know."

"Forget about it, I don't want to know. I'm leaving."

Rinoa nervously ambled back down toward the other corridor, and, for some reason, the nervousness doubled when she saw Squall nearby.

"Did you hear any of that?"

'_Of course not. Mindless chatter doesn't concern me, so why listen?' _

"…No."

"Good. Feel better?"

"…Why do you care?"

"Well, when you can't stand by yourself that usually means that you're not 100 percent, you know." Rinoa joked; as usual, Squall didn't find it very amusing.

"Lighten up, if we're going to survive another night and day together, we've got to stick together and you need a sense of humour my friend." She added.

"…I'm leaving."

'_Now I'm going to do that practice I intended to do, I just need to… escape from this nightmare of a day..'_

At that point, Rinoa stood there dumbfounded. "…_Huh?_"

_---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"_Parry…Swipe..Turn… Duck… Parry-" _Squall muttered under his breath as he was going through the motions, trying to clear the multiple failures he'd experienced in the short while he and Rinoa had been trapped inside the school. But it wasn't working, several thoughts kept on seeping into mind, occupying space.

'_Why isn't this getting my mind off of things? I feel… off today, like there's something not right, something missing, what is it though?_'

As soon as his latest thought session was over with, in the corner of his eye, he noticed Rinoa slowly and shyly entering the gym with her bag. Assuming that she was here to see him, he stopped and acknowledged her presence, just slightly though.

"You want to spar together now?"

"…Sure."

"Okay, but I won't hold back, you know that right?"

"…Neither will I."

"Good. Let's start."

Rinoa smirked a little as she headed for the center of the gym, where Squall was. Although she wasn't exactly sure, the teen thought she saw a small, positive change in his facial expression, or it might have been the naturally subdued lighting playing tricks on her. Who knew anymore? Meanwhile, the other teen made a small side note in the actual change in his mindset.

'_Hmm… The void earlier is clearing away… Maybe all I was just missing a partner to practice with…'_

During the practice, Squall noticed improvement in Rinoa's technique and overall performance and found himself in tight situations for often than before; mulling it over, he decided on commenting it – it'd be an insult not to.

"…You're.. getting better."

"Yeah, I know. That duel with Seifer and Fujin really got me to thinking about those 'real-life' situations that Janis is always droning about, before that I didn't take those applications and techniques seriously, but now I know those things were actually effective, it's like a spark triggered or something. Oops- let my guard down…" As soon Rinoa finished speaking, Squall got her trapped in a somewhat complex technique, rendering her immobile, ending the hour-long practice.

After both of them changed and showered in their respective locker rooms, they both walked down together to eat the second half of the day's rations. It was late afternoon and Rinoa had been complaining during the last 15 minutes of their training that the noises emitting from Squall's stomach were 'gross and disturbing' and that he should eat something before she'd have to drag his corpse around the school. Considering that he didn't want to hear her nagging for the rest of the day, he agreed without objections, although he did object to other things that Rinoa had 'humorously' suggested.

Halfways there she'd started talking again.

"In order to figure out that you liked practicing with somebody instead of by yourself I had to use weird logic you know."

Squall arched his eyebrow at this, the first reason being for the weird comment she'd made, the other for how she seemingly figured him out so accurately. But alas, he finally accepted that he couldn't stay completely shrouded in mystery if it was only the two of them in here. So what, after all, didn't his father know something about him after living with him too? Those kinds of side effects were unavoidable when these sorts of conditions were set upon them.

"…Whatever."

"You know deep down that I'm right. Admit it." Rinoa teased.

"……Fine."

"Knew it! Hee…"

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**End of chapter comments – **I'll try from now on to be timely like I said before. Sorry if anybody is OOC or anything was out of place or repetitive, I haven't written a chapter or played the game in the longest time. I hope that this chapter was of equal quality too and that it answered some review's questions or fulfilled others.

As always, keep reviewing with ideas, comments or anything you guys have to say! Thanks again!


	5. Chapter V –Twin Perspectives

**Author's note – **I'm so glad that everyone seemed to enjoy that last chapter. Trust me, I was trying my best to finish it in the last two days prior to its' release. Another thing was that I was surprised at how many of you guys reviewed so fast, not even after the first day on fanfiction and I already had some reviews for it! I take that as the biggest compliment of all. But I'm surprised that no one caught the certain bits of dialogue pulled from the game, though… Oh well! Thanks a million everybody!

Now I've got to answer those reviews or else I think that Adel **will** be after my blood...

**Responses to reviews for Chapter 4**

_Hold on, I've got to respond to the one I missed from Chapter 3 first!_

_Breath of Fire_ – Oops, I'm so sorry that I missed your review, I just noticed it after I had uploaded the last chapter… Hope you liked it though!

_Onto the Chapter 4 reviews now…_

_DBZ Fanfiction Queen_ – Thanks for the compliments and opinions too, and trust me, this fic will not go to waste.

As for your points of view regarding Seifer, I completely respect that, in fact I only had him act a bit more uncharacteristically cruel was only because he was bitter from losing to Squall earlier and I only had him gang up on him was because I needed some way for Squall to lose without using the 'random headaches' for a excuse again. That'd be too repetitive, and on top of that, I couldn't use my original plan because I'd changed a lot of things prior to that duel sequence.

And you know… Seifer fights a little dirty sometimes, right?

_silver-nex_ – Yeah, you're right, Squall _does_ get hurt a lot in this fic, but don't worry, what he doesn't know can't hurt him (regarding Rinoa and Seifer's past) and he be hurting so much anymore. Also I did that to add more elements from the game so I made their situation parallel, where she was only with him during the summer when she was 16.

_Heartillyangel_ – Glad you liked (and noticed) the change of maturity in Rinoa, and don't worry, Squall will change eventually too; things like that need to be somewhat gradual and timed properly for it to seem realistic.

_tidusXyuna637_ – Thank you for the compliments, I personally try and keep 'em at about +5,000 words for each chapter. Hope that this update is fast enough.

…Okay this chapter should be getting good; I've added major lines from the game that I think fit pretty well in the story. Plus, you guys will finally see a different side of Squall so get ready in anticipation! (I hope that it won't stink in comparison to the rest of the story…)

On your mark, get set, READ!

_**Edit (08/07/06) **– Just fixed some formatting errors and typos._

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**Chapter V –Twin Perspectives**

Waking up in the infirmary bed felt really good for both captives the next day. Not only were they fully rested from a 'fun' day yesterday, but this would be the last time they'd be doing so. Why was that, you ask? Well… today was Monday, the last day of their imprisonment; the last day of their extensive weekend sentence. Neither could wait until the next day, to be back again into the normal flow of school, going home and the other things that was included in an average teenage life as well.

Squall, being the first of the pair to awaken, got up silently and stretched his arms and legs a bit to get rid of the knots formed during his sleep. As soon as he was done and moved sleep and bangs away from his eyes, he went to look at the time from Rinoa's watch left on the small night table. Today, it read 8:27. Glancing at the watch made Squall remember about what she'd said about that the night before. He couldn't help but smirk slightly while recollecting her antics from that night.

"_Squall, I'll leave my watch on the table beside me so neither of us dies from a heart attack at age 17, okay?"_

Returning to the real world again, he went back to his own side, remade his bed and left the room without so much as a single noise while closing the door courteously to ensure that its' sleeping occupant did not rouse. While certain things could be said about his behavior, Squall was never one to wake other people's slumber; even if it was a person to whom he thought to be annoying, derived from a contrasting personality.

But was she really annoying anymore? He'd gotten used to the quirks considerably, therefore, should she- or that still considered a nuisance? He'd been all the more confounded on the subject as each passing day ended and as he adapted more and more. Also, new, foreign f_eel-_ occurrences came to afflict his thoughts, notions and reflections repeatedly as well thoroughly; what was this new alienation from his normal self _exactly?_ Squall wouldn't figure that out for the life of him as he sat down near the infirmary door.

'_I found her annoying from the start, but that's getting better, she's matured a bit. I've gotten used to all of her silly traits and forgive other antics; it's only normal trying to make the situation slightly easier to cope with, rather than being stuck with a brick wall…' _

'_-But there's so much I don't understand too… I've been experiencing different mental sensations, but what? She's seemed very suspicious at times, and I don't know why…' _

'_Maybe in reality this is all superficial and I should ignore it… But I can't... Is there something wrong with me? Normally, I'd brush these kinds of things off easily.'_

Shuffling footsteps inside the room itself were now being heard, interrupting all thoughts, everything. Rinoa had woken up and seemed to be now approaching the door judging from the sound of her steps increasing in volume.

"Awake already?" Rinoa asked, head peeking out from the door. Squall nodded.

"That's good. At least I'm not talking to a sleepwalker in disguise." She jokingly added while fully exiting through the door, and after she continued to talk. "I fell out of bed again today… Guess I move too much in my sleep, huh?"

'_No you don't, you were perfectly motionless every time I'd seen you asleep. You probably fall out on purpose for fun; I'd be ready to bet my Revolver on that._'

"Just so you know Squall, this morning I'll be in the weights room, bouncing on the trampoline. Would you like to go with me, or will you be elsewhere as always?"

'…_You know, I think I'll change things up for once, let her get the shock. That way, she'll rethink about assuming to know me cover-to-cover like a book._'

"I've never been on a trampoline."

"So is that a _yes?_" She asked gleefully.

"I guess…"

As they started to walk down the other extremity of the corridor, Rinoa lips started to curve into a smile. Squall took note of this and sort of wondered why she was doing so for no particular reason, it wasn't a date or anything. However, he had the sneaking suspicion that she had something up her sleeve.

"You _do_ realize that I used some reverse psychology back there, Squall?"

'…_What?_'

"-I already knew what you'd do if I hadn't added the _'or will you be elsewhere as always' _part, and although I can't say that I know much about you or anything from your past, I used the one major thing that I **did** know against you."

"…What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about your weird phobia of someone actually getting to 'know' you; to know about the _real_ you. So I influenced your actions based off of that. …I guessed that you wouldn't like being stereotyped, that way I secretly made you do the opposite by figuring that you'd want to throw me off when I said that part at the end. And it worked too; worked so easily…you kinda surprised me."

Squall didn't know to think about this at all, he felt lost, angry, and violated. You name it, he probably felt it. Not because he'd been put through a ruse to do something involuntarily, it was the simple fact that she'd figured him out. Had his perfect façade finally shattered to bits after all these years? Right now, all he could do think about it.

Although Rinoa **was** right, she wasn't completely right.

'_She's not entirely right about that one. Sure, I don't open up to other people or want them to know me either; but it's not as simple as that. I don't let people in because eventually they'll become closer, then that'll develop into friendship and then eventually they start to rely on you, but you know what? Nothing lasts in this world. It feels great to have friends who believe in you, and adults you can rely on. That's why it's so dangerous, especially if you become used to it. Someday you're bound to lose everything. Everybody around you will be gone. Then what are you left with? Nothing. Nobody... It's so miserable. And it's inevitable. It's so hard to recover from something like that. I never ever want to deal with that again. I can't, even if it means being alone...'_

"Squall, are you alright? Sorry if I tricked you into coming with me, you can do something else if you want."

"No…it's fine, I'll come. I just need to take a small walk before I meet up with you again, that's all."

"That's…okay. See you later." The other teenager started to walk the other way just before she added a final bit before their temporary parting.

"Squall-" She paused as he turned around momentarily to hear the rest. "…I'm sorry if I hurt you in any way today. It's just that… _sometimes_ I can't stand being alone all the time, I… just needed someone to get me through. I apologize again if that sounded selfish, I won't do it again, I promise."

"…It's fine Rinoa." Squall mumbled as he proceeded to turn back again, walking once more in the opposite direction.

'_It's okay; I understand where you're coming from. Sometimes, I just wish that I could feel that way too…_'

Walking alone to reflect on things didn't help Squall one bit. He was at a crossroads; should he admit why he was so cold towards everyone over the years to Rinoa and get this burden off of him? Or should he brush this incident off and continue like the way he'd promised himself when he was five? Neither seemed to be an adequate answer to his problem; neither resolution seemed complete somehow.

'_What should I do? I'm so confused… She knows too much already… What if she tells somebody else? To tell the truth... I worry too much about what others think of me. I hate that side of me... That's another reason why I didn't want anyone to get to know me. I wanted to hide that side of myself. I hate it. Squall is an unfriendly, introverted guy. It made it easy for me when people perceived me that way. But now, I don't know if I can continue like this…' _

Just then, a flashback of that dreadful summer night a year after his sister and mother's death came to mind; a younger version of himself could be seen sitting by his bedroom window, watching rain splatter against the window by himself, not wanting any company whatsoever.

"**_I'm...all alone. But I'm doing my best... I'll be ok without you, Sis. I'll be able to take care of myself." _**

"But why should I continue this? ...I didn't turn out ok at all." He said to himself truthfully, but then a slew of contradicting thoughts came in, Squall couldn't decide which ones were true to himself anymore.

'_No, I'm fine by myself now. I have all the skills I need to survive. I'm not a child anymore.' _

'_That's a lie. I don't know anything. I'm confused.'_

'_I don't want to depend on anyone. How can I do that?' _

'_Someone tell me...' _

'_Someone? So I'll end up depending on others after all.' _

'_What is happening to me? **I can't take it anymore! **Nrrgh...'_

He stopped walking and leaned on a corridor wall, pressing his palms against his eyelids for a moment to give his subconscious a break and started reassuring himself vocally instead mentally to avoid a brain implosion.

"…Maybe I looked too much into that, severely overreacting even… maybe she was just using my ego to be with her like she said… Perhaps I'm safe…if I can keep myself sane somehow; I didn't come through all of these years just to blow up and break a promise by one off-hand comment…I'm not ready to let your memory to be insulted Ellone. Not ever."

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"Where's Squall, it's been nearly an hour since he'd said that he was going to take a small walk, and I have something to show him!" Rinoa said to herself, bouncing impatiently on the trampoline.

"…Sorry I'm late." Squall mumbled in apology seconds later while going through the door.

"There you are! I was beginning to think that you'd forgotten how to get here! Listen I've got something to tell you!"

"What, that you can do back flips?" He replied sarcastically.

"Ha. Ha. Very funny. No, I found something in Mr. Janis's office that might help us today. I was browsing his office while I was waiting for you."

'_Wonder what she found, our S.D/ Weaponry marks? No… that can't be it, she wouldn't seem so excited from that…But I can never really tell with her though._'

Rinoa led Squall downstairs into the gym, backtracking to the office nearby. Once inside, she showed him one of the cupboards. It happened to be filled with various energy bars and sports drinks. Squall was hitting himself on the head; why hadn't he thought of this? He knew perfectly well that the teacher in question always had a supply of these in case if a student fainted or looked very sickly. After mentally berating himself, Rinoa started to explain how she found the aforementioned supplies.

"When I started to get bored to death waiting for you, I remembered that Janis's office was close by. Just for fun, I went in here; I wanted to see our grades in S.D class so far. While I was peeking around the drawers looking for his infamous clipboard, the search lead me to find this stuff. So lets' dig in!"

After they both finished at their respective paces, they got up energetically, full of life for the first time since the weekend. It was something the pair of them had long forgotten seeing how the prior days had passed so slowly that it felt like an eternity. Rinoa was most welcoming to the liveliness restored to their bodies as she stretched her arms.

"This feels much better! It's like I'm completely back to my old self again, what about you Squall?"

'_Actually I feel better as well. Before, I was under the sneaking suspicion that my pants were starting to fall off on their own accord._'

"…Same as always."

"That's gotta suck then. Kidding! C'mon, lets' go jumping!" And with that, she smiled and then took Squall's hand and started to drag him up the stairs to go to the trampoline in the weights room.

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"…So all you do is jump?" He asked, being very unsure of himself on the flexible materiel.

"Yes Squall, you just jump. Haven't you ever done anything fun or sporadic in your life? You seem to need instructions for ever-y-thing." She drawled out playfully between bounces on the other side of the massive contraption. As Squall started to get the basics of… just bouncing, he started to make a mental note.

'_Not bad. Fun, but not as fun as practicing. …I don't see why she'd find this so amusing though. At least I'm getting used to it._'

"-Hey," She paused to get on the edge, and then resumed talking, "- you want to try to flip? It's easy and the best part of using the trampoline."

"…I'll try it, but I'd need instructions."

"Sure, I can teach you." Rinoa replied aloud, and then whispered a silent, "_And I'd thought you'd never ask…_" to herself.

After a few trial-and-error lessons, Squall eventually achieved a flip on his own accord. The flip part was easy, the hard part was letting go of the _'This is stupid…'_ thoughts drifting continuously through his head. In the end, after they'd had their fill of bouncy goodness that the jumping apparatus had to offer, the pair genuinely had fun. Rinoa was the only one showing it physically, in contrast, Squall kept all signs to himself; unbeknownst to him, she could still tell he had some fun in it.

As they were descending the stairs, Rinoa suggested that they should practice offence and defense techniques for a bit, saying that she wanted to be prepared for the performance examination during the next S.D class. Since she saw through him when he was trying to conceal his true regard on the activity they'd done beforehand, Squall could see through her this time; this time, he was secretly appreciative of the gesture.

'_She may be a bit odd on the outside, but she's really a good-hearted person. I guess she's really not all that bad after all, maybe… I can trust her…'_

After they had started up dueling, Squall found himself working harder than he'd ever been before, even more intense than with his confrontation with Seifer Friday afternoon, fuelled on a kind of drive he'd never felt previously. It was definitely an unprecedented sensation because he didn't know what to make of it at all.

'_Why am I acting this way? -dodge- It's not like I'm –side step- against Seifer and that -duck- I could lose face… It's not like me to have an underlying urge to –duck again- show her up or anything…' _

'_-Maybe I'm just compelled to go to the -parry- next level in training… But still, I feel like I'm lying to myself because… I know for a fact that it's -jump- something else…Maybe.'_

"Hey Squall, lay off the throttle please, I can't keep on going like this…"

"…Sorry." He mumbled.

"It's-" She paused while crouching momentarily, "…okay, at least I'll be able to ace that test. On second thought- continue like this."

'_What's with the change of heart so suddenly? Nevermind... Knowing her it'll have something to do with me…_'

"-You still with me here?"

"…What?"

"Stop for a moment please."

As if on command, Squall stopped all actions on cue. Yet the ever-going thought button didn't seem to comply with Rinoa's order; nothing could ever stop that no matter how hard the teenager tried. That's was a given he couldn't seem to live without from living an unorthodox lifestyle for nearly twelve years. That and the ever-popular cerulean-eyed complex stare he always had on. In fact, he was giving Rinoa a five-star stare right now – along with an annoyed, _'Why-are-you-stopping'_ position with the rest of his body.

"Squall… Would it be okay if you focused a bit more on practicing, not thinking. It's just that… one minute you're going all out…the next, you're not. …And every time you're like that I can see it in your eyes and it's giving you away; you're out thinking about… stuff. Can you please be more consistent and concentrate more. _Please?_"

Automatically, by force of habit he started thinking about it instead of saying it out aloud.

'…_Was it that obvious?_'

"Squall… you're doing it again." She pointed out with a smile.

"…I didn't mean to. Old habits die hard."

"Before we start up again I've got to tell you something."

'_You've always got to tell me something, that's the problem._'

"You know...something I've always noticed about you is that… You're always too deep in thought. Why don't you lighten up a little? It's not good to think much. What I'm trying to say is... It would be my honor... to have your company, your highness, in hope that I may get your mind off things. -How about it, your highness?" She offered half-seriously, half-jokingly, ending her speech in a little jester's bow.

'_Better not, you'd make use my head tenfold with all those loopy ideas of yours instead of actually helping me think less.'_

"Quit the _'your highness''s_ or I'll **think** about it." He retorted sarcastically.

"I guess that's a _no_ then? Doesn't matter, I'll still try. You'll see!"

"…Lets' just practice, _alright?_" Squall tiredly demanded, drowsy from listening too much.

"Fine, but stay on track, okay?"

"Yeah..._Your highness._"

"What was that last part?"

"-Nothing. …Just thinking."

After they resumed training for a good period of time, Squall found himself doing the same thing again; going all out, heart racing, but this time his stomach seemed to be doing back flips mysteriously as well. He tried as hard as he could to shut out all thoughts as he'd agreed to do earlier, but one particular one kept on conveying strongly no matter what, and it was,

'-_What's **happening** to me?_'

As the feeling expanded to even greater dimensions, all of the surplus cryptic drive and its' effects internally receded, all felt normal again to the 5'8" Leonhart, but then he realized something vital; he was actually getting very tired and so was she.

In an act of new apprehension of their weariness, he asked her if she'd want to stop; Rinoa agreed completely, giving off some kind of look of inner relief present in her eyes. Soon they did the blossoming post-practice ritual of going to their own locker rooms to do whatever they needed to do, and then came out to travel the halls at the same time. Today Rinoa had mentioned that she'd needed a nap from all of this and other adolescent was just about really to do the same as well.

"Thanks for saying something. I wanted to talk about it earlier but you had this look in your eyes, not a 'thinking look', and I can't completely explain it… all I can say that it was more like you had some kind of a spark in there that was making you focus extra-hard."

'_So it really wasn't just my imagination…_'

As they got to the teachers' lounge, both teenagers took different couches and started to get ready for a well-needed sleep.

"…You taking a nap too?" Rinoa asked before falling asleep.

Turning around, he groggily gave her another one of his _'what's-it-look-like?'_ stares in return.

"Sorry… I didn't expect you to need sleep after that…That's all." She innocently explained; all questions expelled from her ceased as she soon fell dead to the world in slumber.

'_Just because I seem inhuman, doesn't mean that I can't get tired like a normal person._' He thought before drifting off himself.

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As early as she was certain that her cohort was sleep, Rinoa got up and secretly escaped the teachers' lounge in complete silence. Not sure of how much time she had before Squall would wake up again, she scurried to her locker. Oh how she hated to have all of the constant air of secrecy and suspicion surround her. Rinoa was never one to keep secrets and sneak around like this.

Making sure the coast was clear, she opened her locker. Inside, she saw her backpack, blanket, gym bag and finally… cell phone. Just the thought of just looking at it seemed to invoke that particular lie she'd said recently in her head.

"**_Yes I do have some ideas, but that all depends." _**

**  
"_On…?"_**

"**_Do you have some one waiting for you at home, or at least have a cell phone?"_   
**

"**_No, my father's out of town, he had to go to Deling City for the weekend, but even if he were home, he wouldn't care. He'd probably think that I'm at someone's house or something. As for your other question, I left my cell at home; I thought I wouldn't need it today."_ **

She felt horrible for lying, but at the time she knew that her phone was at too low of a power to properly work for a decently-timed call, all she'd be achieving would be giving false hope… but maybe she could try _now? _She wasn't going to achieve anything by staying here with Squall even if she'd tried; and if she did call now and it didn't work, he wouldn't be let down because he wouldn't know anything about it. When it was all decided unanimously, weighed by the pros and cons inside her head, Rinoa started dialing home.

Midway into making the call however, brisk and sharp footsteps could be heard coming from the adjoining corridor nearby. Fearing that it was a burglar or even Seifer again, Rinoa panicked and put her phone back and closed the locker door rapidly. Even though the steps were now echoing less and less, she didn't want to take a chance, so she ran back to the lounge in haste.

Back inside, Rinoa found Squall still resting, considering that she didn't want to come off as suspicious, she pretended to be sleeping. At least in here she'd have him to protect her if worse came to worse. She just hoped that whoever it was wasn't going to stay.

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Nearly half an hour after he fell asleep, Squall had woken up again. As he stood up, everything appeared in order - no change whatever. This was the way he preferred things to be. Surveying the surroundings, all pretty well seemed normal, even so, he found himself double-checking, nowadays he couldn't be too sure with the current situation.

After his inspection, Squall went to his locker to retrieve the homework he'd failed to accomplish yesterday. While doing so, the teen heard some weird noises, but he ignored it figuring that it was just his mind playing tricks on him. Although a part of him was nearly certain that he'd actually heard some light footsteps in the distance.

When he arrived back in the room, Rinoa was awake and rubbing her eyes. Right after, she looked upon him, analyzing what he'd had in hand, and that seemed to give her the idea of completing her own history homework as well. She zoomed out and back in the chair-strewn piece to get her own things. Soon, they inevitably started doing some homework together.

"Squall, could you help me with some of the Lunar Cry homework? I don't quite get it."

"…Turn to page 374. It's got all of the essential information you're supposed to use."

"Thanks, but I was sort of hoping that you'd explain some of it, I'm horrible for reading history textbooks. I always have trouble getting the information to stick inside my head."

"No, all you basically have to do is put the text definition and dates into your own sentences. That's it…"

"Thanks." She replied but she was actually thinking, _'I almost got him to help me that time…Darn!'_ inside her head.

Meanwhile, the thought of, '_Nice try Rinoa. Try harder next time with some math homework or something._' was occupying the other captive's.

However, both of their thoughts ceased when they heard heavy footsteps clunking around the perimeter, just near the exterior of the lounge's door. Both of their thoughts then turned to paranoia when they heard the footsteps accompany an eerie tone grudgingly murmur a "_…They must be **here**…_" located even closer... the threat was probably meant to be directed at them as well.

"_Hyne…I'm scared.. What if he **finds** us?_" Rinoa whispered apprehensively.

"…He won't find us. We've got to hide behind that black couch, the one on the far side. Go now while he's not looking."

At that moment, electricity and nerves were in the air; Rinoa was considerably tense and on the verge of a panic attack, Squall was trying to conceal his inner anxiety and keeping both of them hidden at the same time, it was a good thing that he was very adept at multitasking.

'_She's so panicky… but I don't blame her, I even feel sorry for her… What happens if she's killed and her father doesn't even think anything of her disappearance? I won't let that ever be the case. I'll protect her to ensure that it never happen - even if I'm the one who dies in the end…' _

Subconsciously, not even realizing it, Squall then secured his arms around Rinoa, protecting her from any danger they might confront. For now though, all that there was developing was the silence from the unshed cries that the embrace consoled.

A few minutes later, the same stranger seemed to be pacing back and forth between the lounge's outside door, towards the gym and back. Just when they had both thought that the outsider to be gone for good, he ultimately delivered a colossal shock down their collective spines as he actually opened the lounge door, finally realizing that the lock was open.

Not a breath was taken or expelled from Squall or Rinoa since then.

"Hmph… They said that they'd be easy to find - not in this dark they won't… Whatever happened to emergency lights in these places 'round here? It's going to take forever to find and fix up those problem-makers…"

Suddenly, a metaphoric light went off in Rinoa's head, causing her to recollect something important as she started to think about it, '_Wait.. I know that voice; it's my neighbour Mr. Polce, the electrician from the district school board, not some evil burglar… Geez, this is really awkward… He must have been talking about finding some sort of an electric panel or something… and I was all jumpy for nothing…Squall too… Maybe I should tell him so we can get out – but on the other hand.. I like Squall's arms being wrapped around me, and another night wouldn't kill us. I think I'll keep quiet. But I can't help but feel a little dishonest for this…'_

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After the close call was avoided, the 'mysterious person' seemingly gave up soon as they heard a code being entered for a nearby alarm, followed by the sound of someone stepping on the outdoor gravel and a locking noise at the closest exit point; the entrance leading outside right past the gym. Now being able to breathe comfortably again, the pair got out from the tight confinements of their hiding place. Rinoa made sure to feign relief to not give away any inclination that she actually knew anything about the person who was 'trying to find them'.

"…Phew, I almost forgot how to breathe back there. Thanks for trying to calm my nerves Squall. I really appreciate it; I probably would have jumped out if not for that."

'_It was nothing; I didn't just want something happen.' _Instead of saying what he thought, he simply nodded.

"You know… there might be more people still in here, could we try and stick together in case if something happens – just to be safe?" She inquired convincingly, secretly trying to grasp some benefit from the false state of things they were in; he didn't catch on and fell for it. Hook, line, and sinker.

"…Okay, but let me finish my homework."

"Fine by me, I'll finish mine too." She chirped.

As they resumed doing the school work, a strange pattern soon enveloped whereas they seemed to be scanning each other papers to correct each others' mistakes in the most annoying and vindictive fashion on purpose, and somehow had fun in the process (Squall supposed that he was most likely going mad from being in Rinoa's company for so long). After the rectifying frenzy had finally subsided and they'd finished the assignment, Rinoa burst out laughing.

"_Ha..aha…ha…_ Mrs. Edea… will probably have a seizure …from the brutal exactness from our papers…That is, if she can read though all the scribbles on yours and the huge **_X_**'s on mine…_ha..aha…_" She said through grandiose fits of laughter; even Squall himself couldn't restrain a hint of a small smirk. As soon as she caught sight of this though, Rinoa sobered up from giggling to death and turned towards him with a wide devilish grin on her face.

"So you can smile, that's a first." Squall's trace of a beam suddenly turned into a scowl as he realized exactly what he'd done, what he'd let himself do.

'_How could I have let myself fall into this? I..ruined the smokescreen… I let her to get to me though the damn innocent act of doing HISTORY HOMEWORK! And on top of that, I can't figure out any of these feelings I've been having are! I'm useless.. I can't seem to find myself to think straight anymore… Why could this never started in the first place? Why couldn't I be at home instead? Why…_'

As Squall turned away and quickly strode outside the staff room, Rinoa followed right behind him ready to apologize for setting him off.

"…I didn't mean it that way! Please stop!" Squall surprisingly did turn around, but not to forgive her, as he had yet another icy glare present in his eyes.

"You know what? I've had enough of this. I'm tired of deflecting all of your analyzing and anything else that you're trying to achieve. You were right earlier about me not liking people to know '_the real me'_, so there, you've got your proof. Now stop following me, I'd like to be _alone _for once today."

"…I don't know what to say.."

"Well then don't say anything and just leave." He replied acidly and began walking off in the distance. After he was out of sight, Rinoa sighed to herself.

"He must be at a crossroads or something…Every time he starts to act like a normal human being… he freezes up and reverts back into an icy shell… This has got to be much deeper than just not wanting anyone to know him, maybe I should just stay back and let him cool off before trying to talk to him again. …He might explode if I don't."

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Meanwhile, later during the day, Squall was leisurely sitting against his locker door, contemplating things over.

'_I think I'll be okay if I don't mess up again… I'm feeling better now, and I'm almost certain that she doesn't know any further than that one detail anyway. Hmm.. I wonder where she is though- Wait, I've got to stop thinking about her, that's what got me in this mess in the first place…_'

After that, he got up and started to amble to towards the teachers' lounge to pick up his homework and textbooks to later put them back in his locker. Halfway there, he began to perceive the sound of movement. Squall neglected to think anything of it, presuming that it was either Rinoa or another stranger. At that moment, he didn't care if it was an outsider because he was angry enough that he probably could knock him/her out if he absolutely needed to. As nothing developed as he walked on, the adolescent assumed all was safe and retrieved his homework and proceeded to return it to his locker as planned.

Post getting the task done, he seemed to go through a change of heart; something in his mind didn't seem right now.

Whether or not to follow his inclination started to now tear him up inside. Should he check on Rinoa even after he'd told her off? Or was it better to leave things be? The thing that worried Squall the most was that whenever he made predictions inside his head like this he was usually right about it - but then another notion surfaced and told him by doing this it meant that whatever those feelings he'd experienced before were actually tied to Rinoa herself somehow. Before he could make a decision, he remembered what he'd vowed when they were at risk of danger earlier today.

**-_ I won't let that ever be the case. I'll protect her to ensure that it never happen - even if I'm the one who dies in the end…_**

At that moment, for once in his life, Squall Leonhart went with his heart rather than his head as he ran to where the sounds of footsteps had been heard last, hoping he wasn't too late.

Zipping past the secretaries' office, another noise was heard, not more footsteps; it sounded more like a screech more than anything. Squall's pace then doubled in fear, because it the pitch uncannily seemed to belong to Rinoa. Further down he went, he heard more indistinct talking, the closer he got to the possible origin, the more clear it became.

"-Squall!" A voice, most likely Rinoa's, called out, and possibly in desperation distinguished by the tone.

As he slid around the corner, he saw the brown-eyed girl not in terror, but in smiles along with two other men in the distance. He gave a look of confusion, trying to piece all this together.

"Squall, were free! Your father and the vice principal found me, so we can finally leave now that I've found you!" She declared with pure ecstasy in her voice, all he could do was look in disbelief and point towards his father's now approaching figure.

"I'll explain everything when we get home. Rinoa, would you like to join us for a late lunch? I'll call your father to let him know afterwards." Laguna offered.

"Sure, I'll be delighted to."

"Well, then I'm sure you two should get all of your things and go leave with Mr. Loire, I can't leave the school open forever you know." The vice principal insisted, surprisingly he had no questions to why Squall and Rinoa were in the school in the first place but Rinoa had a question when she left with him to get their stuff.

"Why is your last name Leonhart if your dad's is Loire? Did your mom remarry or something?"

"…No. It's a long story." He replied trying to avoid the subject.

"Oh, okay."

'_The real story was that my father was out of town when I was born, and because my mother kept her surname, I ended up taking too because the hospital staff didn't know she was married. Before she realized that the hospital had made a mistake, it was too late and they had already recorded it officially. But you don't need to know that Rinoa._'

After all they needed was there in order, they left without as much as a hitch, and when they got to the house, Laguna dialed for some take out, and then they all sat down at the dining room table to discuss what happened while they waited for the food.

"Okay, you wanted to know why I was at the school, right Squall?" He nodded in agreement.

"It went like this… My meeting ended a lot sooner than expected, so I was home by Monday morning. When I didn't see you anywhere in the house and your room wasn't locked, I called the next door neighbour to ask if you went out. She said that you'd never came home Friday at all. After that, I phoned up your vice principal figuring that you might have pulled something odd. When I explained the situation to him and he called the bus company to check if you'd been on the bus after school and when he found out that you didn't, we went to the school."

He paused to catch his breath before continuing, "Before we got inside, we bumped into Mr. Polce, the electrician from the district, and funny to say, he'd mentioned that he thought he'd heard something in there, so I knew that you in there. And as you know, we'd found Rinoa first and…kinda startled her by accident, but after that, she explained everything about what happened, so here we are. But there is one question I'd like to ask you, Squall."

"…_What?_" He asked, being pretty sure of what the question was going to be already.

"Where, did you get the scar from? It looks like it'd hurt a lot."

'_You have no idea...'_

"In S.D class got let out early and I… ended being in a duel that went out hand. The guy facing me went berserk and sliced my face open."

"Lemme guess, was it Seifer?" Squall nodded.

"Figures… Was that how it ended?"

"Err… No. I got angry and got even by slashing his forehead in the same way…Sorry."

"_Sorry?_ It's only natural to try to get back… and uh…I'll be back, gotta pick up the food now, it takes awhile to get there. Why don't you show Rinoa around while I'm gone Squall? Gotta go!"

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"Lively fellow, isn't he?" She said while getting off her chair.

"…Yeah."

"Come on, get up. Let's go."

"Go where?"

"Give me a tour of the house."

"...Is this another one of your orders?"

"No. Weren't you listening to your father? I just want you to show me around. You know, to get acquainted with the place. Please?"

"...Fine."

While he was half-heartedly showing her around, Rinoa stumbled upon an old photo on his father's desk in his study (if you could call it that) and picked it up. The picture depicted a happier time when Squall's mother and sister Ellone were still alive; it was a complete family portrait in the park.

"-This your family?" She asked while gazing at the old photo. After the question had been asked, Squall glanced at it too.

"Yeah."

"Is that your mother and sister too?"

"Yes."

"Where are they now?" Not realizing it, she'd hit the very nerve that she was trying to avoid. Squall left the study trying to avoid answering her question; she'd know too much if he were to respond to it.

"…Squall?" She then put back the photo back to its' original place on the desk and went to follow him. When Rinoa found him, he was above the base of the stairs.

"There you are! You never answered my question. You know."

"…What was it again? I didn't hear you." He insincerely replied; he already knew that he was trapped into answering, but at least that was buying him time. Luckily for him however, Laguna chose that opportune moment to come through the door.

"The food's here guys! Squall could you come down and lend a hand, I need some plates and forks at the table."

"_-I'm_ coming." He quickly answered back, taking full advantage of the opportunity his father had given him. When Rinoa noticed the speed he was going to dodge the question, she knew that something was up. But she dismissed it temporarily to join Laguna and him for lunch.

"Take a seat Rinoa, would you like something to drink?" Laguna offered.

"No thanks, I'm fine." She declined.

"I've taken the liberty of calling your father already; he'll be over shortly after lunch, around 2:30."

"Oh, okay." Though the cheerful adult didn't notice, while he was bringing the dishes and forks, Squall could secretly sense that Rinoa didn't sound too pleased with the thought of returning to her father.

'_She doesn't want to go back, and from what she'd said in the school, it seems like her father is very indifferent towards her. That's got to suck._'

"Squall, are you just going to stay there and think? Bring those over before the food gets cold." His father teased.

"_Hee…_So I'm not the only who feels that Squall thinks too much, Mr. Loire?" Rinoa added.

"Nope, you're not kiddo, and please, call me Laguna. Sorry about all of the teasing. Now, lets' eat!"

Right after finishing their meal and cleaning the dishes, Rinoa thanked Laguna for ordering the wonderful food and went straight upstairs to get her things, and as her father was bound to arrive anytime soon, she Squall-napped Squall in the process and dragged him to his room. _(A/N – Get your mind out of the gutter, that's where her things are.)_

"Squall, can you think of anything to stall my father from coming? I really don't want to go with him." She pleaded.

"…I can't think of anything." He replied ironically.

"It doesn't have to be legal. You can chop his legs off if you want."

"Err..no. …Slash his tires?"

"Can you think of something else, I'm sure he'd have a way around that."

"…Why _don't_ you want to go home?" He inquired, trying to avoid finding gruesome solutions to delaying her father.

"Family issues. I don't like him and he doesn't like me-" He zoned out for a second to think, '_Bingo!_' then returned to listen again. "-and with this happening, he'd probably thinks that I stayed on purpose just to get some with you."

Caught on whether to say it or think it, Squall decided to be brave and say, "…Wasn't that your intention in the first place?"

"Ha. Ha. Very funny, I outta slap you for that one but I won't because your father is such a nice host. I still can't believe that you're his son, you're too different in comparison."

'_Ding-dong!'_

"Damn! Do you have a shotgun here that I can use?"

"…No."

"Oh well, see you around Squall. And remember, pay attention to Mrs. Edea's reaction from our papers tomorrow! Bye!" She said while grinning as she brought her things and hopped down the stairs to leave with her father. One thing that Squall perceived was that her beautiful smile soon evaporated as soon as she'd seen Mr. Caraway in the driveway; he felt sorry for her, at least his father was clumsy.

After she'd left, his own clumsy father went upstairs to talk to him about the weekend; particularly about Rinoa.

"Nice girl, that Rinoa Heartilly. What do you think?"

Squall stayed silent as usual.

"Pity. You should have asked her out while you had the chance." That caught him off-guard.

"…_What?_"

"Well you had the chance all weekend to get to know her, and like I said, she seems to be a good person from what I could tell."

"…Whatever."

"You know that you're weird, right? You waste the perfect opportunity that other guys can only dream about and your only concern in life is practicing techniques and school work. You're just as bad as a workaholic SeeD. You never cease to amaze me Squall."

And with that comment, Squall went into his room, locked the door and started reading to get his mind off things. However, he couldn't seem to pry himself away from reflecting on the events that happened not too long ago.

'_I can't concentrate… all I can think about is what happened. Usually I can read things no matter what time it is, but now.. Well, that's a different story; maybe I should take a nap. Yes, a nap sounds good right about now._'

And off he went to sleep. Meanwhile, at Rinoa's house, in her room, Rinoa herself was thinking aloud to herself about the same thing – the weekend she'd spent with the reclusive Squall Leonhart in full detail - colour vision even.

"Wow… I didn't think that he was all that complex, I just though he was simply anti-social… Imagine losing both your sister and mother, no wonder he's so distant and cold. I wish that I could help break out of that shell, but he'd just reject me. At least he's gotten a bit better, I think.. Who knows with him though, it's like he's under cloud of mystery or something… He's got nice blue-gray eyes though, when he's not glaring them at you that is…"

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Later, after his nap and late supper, Squall began to partake in the only thing that he could find enjoyable since reading wasn't an option anymore; practicing techniques in the basement to prepare himself for the evaluation later in S.D class.

However he wasn't doing the kind of practice he normally did, it was only as of late that caught himself doing the techniques and movement designed against projectiles instead of the usual ones for defending and countering versus other gunblades – particularly Seifer's Hyperion.

'_Why is she indirectly evading my mind? Before it was me being unable to read because I couldn't stop thinking about the weekend which she was a part of, and now I'm doing the same movements we did together while practicing… Am I falling for Rinoa? No - that's nonsense; it's just a coincidence… that's all…_'

"…Or is it really?" He added aloud, not sure of what to believe anymore.

Later that night, both Squall Leonhart and Rinoa Heartilly had immense difficulty in falling asleep; as the pair were being haunted by the different thoughts enveloping them during those crucial hours of darkness, when they should have been sleeping soundly.

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**End of chapter comments – **Wow, that's been the longest chapter to date, 7689 words to be exact. What a week!

I hope you guys liked the way I had them escape, the discovery of Squall's insecurities (very parallel to the game, don't you think?), and that this chapter in general (along with the script pulled from the game) was good, effective and well placed. I'm sorry if this chapter might have been confusing from Squall's overreactions and the like.

I've said it four times already, but… keep on reviewing with ideas, comments or anything you guys have to say! Thanks!


	6. Chapter VI – Obscurity, Aftermath, and M

**Author's note – **Gah! The typos and errors! And I'd changed them too! …Stupid uploading thingy… Oh, you're reading this... Oops!

Okay, just to let you guys know, in this chapter, given to me as a suggestion, I'll be going backwards in time and start it off when Rinoa gets to her house Monday afternoon.

I'm doing this because I really stretched the final paragraphs of the last chapter. I was afraid of making it too long (think around +8,000 words), because I didn't want to lose readers' interest and I also had in mind about something my English teacher kept on saying to me whenever I'd submit a piece in English. It was that he would always say that I should be less wordy (stop using so many words) and try and condense it more. But on the contrary, people here seem to like my 'wordy-ness' so I apologize and make a humble offering by offering to pseudo-rewrite the last bit from the last chapter.

Eek! I've already wrote… 169 words, better get on those reviews! Fast!

**Responses to reviews for Chapter 5**

_DBZ Fanfiction Queen_ – Thank you for the overall comments, I didn't realize that Laguna's comments were all that funny, and don't worry, I'll backtrack to show what Caraway's like.

Sorry about rushing the last part, if you've read the author's note, you'll know why. As far as thoughts go, the intention for that last chapter was to give a bit of insight from Rinoa's POV for a brief moment. But the main focus however, **is** on Squall, though. As you'll soon see I'll be reverting back to that system as soon as Tuesday morning begins in this chapter. But there's a reason for that, you'll understand later. Hee…

_Ayato_ – Thank you for the short and sweet comment. Sometimes, those end up being the best you get. :)

_silver-nex_ / _heartillyangel_ – Since your reviews were so darn similar (It freaked me out…), I'd thought to respond to both of them at the same.

You guys will be happy to hear that I did have something in mind for the pair at school. Plus, Squall will stop thinking his brains out and finally **do** something for a change. I won't say _what_ though. I'm so evil… Muahaha! Who am I kidding?

_tidusXyuna637_ – Glad to hear that you liked it, and trust me; I get impatient waiting for things too.

_Tsuki Leonhart_ – I'm pleased to know that my winding chapters are worth it, thanks!

_Lady-Rinoa_ – I'm happy that you liked the transition and where this thing is going, and I will try and maintain the quality too.

_Breath of Fire _– Ooh… I'm glad that somebody reviewed about that part, I'm surprised no one thought of that sooner, and don't worry, that question gets answered sometime soon. Hee!

_SavannahX _– Thanks for your review!

_**(2x)** Luis _– You must really want me to update if you sent me two reviews saying to me to update soon, hope you'll like this lengthy chapter. Also, I hope that you'll have a good vacation as well.

…Seeing as I'm done all reviews, I should really get a start in moving onto this chapter! **_Charge!_**

_**-Crash!-**_

"…Ouch… I tripped over my feet…_Oww…Go…_"

_**Edit (08/07/06) **– Fixed some typos._

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**Chapter VI – Obscurity, Aftermath, and Metamorphosis **

Coming home from Squall's was unbearable; the awkward silence shared between Rinoa and her father during the trip home waned her patience, she knew he wanted to say something yet… he somehow didn't dare to fill the void.

And it was this very thing, this silence, which was driving her so insane.

How could he be so calm in face of this situation? How could he show no care, no concern, no …difference towards the possibility of the endangerment of her well-being so effortlessly? Hyne, she'd be happier if he'd yelled blue-murder at her, that way - at least he'd be saying something then.

Stepping out of the car, Rinoa grabbed her things very hastily, in hopes of beating her father to the doorway. As he neared the front entrance to insert the key, she ran behind him and dipped underneath his right arm to block the door with her presence. Mr. Caraway looked very perplexed indeed from his daughter's sudden actions.

"Rinoa, what are you doing?" He asked curtly.

"-Did you even care where I was until Squall's father called?" Rinoa questioned fiercely.

"Well… of course I did." He replied somewhat half-heartedly.

"Typical, you obviously didn't. I can tell when you don't mean what you say, General."

"-_How_ could you say such a thing, Rinoa, you're always with one friend or another, I can't keep track anymore!"

"Well, when you did realize that I was stuck at school all weekend after speaking with Mr. Loire, and went to pick me up, why didn't you say something then? Something to let me at least know you cared for me for_ Hyne's sake_!"

"Well…_I..._ -_To_ be honest... I just didn't know where to begin."

"Yeah, because you need to care in order to begin!" She then paused to stand aside. "_Lets' just go inside_…it's pretty obvious what happened here."

Rinoa's father unlocked the front door, but stood still, keeping it closed behind him. His eyes were set in such a way towards Rinoa, that, they were seemingly suggesting that she should say what she really thought.

"Oh… You want to know, do you?" Her father nodded silently, anticipating the answer.

"Well, I can't tell you. If you can't figure that out yourself, you don't deserve to know. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to my room."

She opened the door and sauntered off to her room on the second floor, where, she started putting certain things away. Only when he was out of an earshot and she was getting reacquainted with the insides of her bedroom walls did she explain what she personally thought happened to them; but she deliberately introduced the idea by a full-scale hypothesis of how their family blew apart into a million pieces in several fragments first. Not to her father of course, but to herself and the various inanimate objects scattered in her room.

"_Well…_ Our family fell apart when you stopped living when Mom died, and when you stopped caring too. _–and that's just for starters..._" She interjected to herself while putting some gym clothes in her hamper.

"…You got absorbed in your work as General…" She mumbled when taking out her notebook and paper.

"…Totally forgot about my existence past middle school…" The raven-haired Heartilly stated after she started recopying her homework.

"…Then fell ill to the illusion that I constantly go over at friend's houses… _even on school nights…_" That same girl declared angrily subsequent to when she finished republishing that said homework.

"…and lately, you started to only find it important to say something to me when you were under the assumption I was trying to hook up with guys_…Which, I'm surprised to say you broke that rule today…I'd have expected you to say something, a possible casual side-line comment to try and sneak it in…_" She muttered later as she readied herself to go down the stairs for supper.

The evening meal was a formal affair, the '_please_ and _thank you's _were exchanged in between some simple food passing, but other than that, all was silent, which was surprisingly a new record in the Heartilly-Caraway household. But things did, however perk up around the end of the meal. Volume-wise, that was.

"Rinoa?" He said, filling the stillness, breaking the record.

"_Yeah?_"

"I'm sorry I didn't say anything earlier, I'd thought that…maybe you wouldn't want to talk about with me."

"…_Really?_"

"Yes." Rinoa truly wanted to believe her father's reply, she really did, but after years of living this way, she'd learned to close her heart to her last remaining family member. She wanted to make sure she wouldn't get hurt again.

"I don't believe you; you're only saying what I want to hear." She replied cynically before leaving.

"_Rin- _Wait here young lady!" In spite of these words, Rinoa waited for no one, and night scenery soon greeted her tired deep brown eyes. Looking out on her balcony window provided a temporary release, a release she'd desperately needed for so long.

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After gazing at the stars for quite some time, the final concluding thought, the thought that she explained all, came to her mind; it came fully-developed after she looked back towards her sullen room, it was an atmosphere befitting to her mood at the moment, gazing out the window into the night sky started to make her sick from all hope it inspired.

"You only stopped caring about me only since I reminded you of too much of Mom, just because it pained you inside to remember a part of what you once had, and that's what hurts. It hurts because that was the only reason you stopped caring about me. But you know what? It's hurt me more than it's ever hurt you, General. It's worse than being an orphan, it's worse than losing everything…"

She ceased her cleansing rant to take another deep look into the heavens, and to brush off a single tear that had fallen onto her cheek, and with that, her thoughts immediately turned to something else to get her mind off the misery that she'd learn to live with.

'_I wonder what it'd be like to have Laguna as a father… Hmm, I probably either laughing 'til my sides were sore everyday or we'd be one of those close-knit families…I've really got to stop thinking that, it's disturbing and getting me back to the same stupid subject…_'

'_-Now that I think about it, I'd like to know why Squall was acting so weird- …err… weirder than usual at his house? Never really got the chance to think about it... Wait a minute; he was fine until I'd asked him about-_'

In a flash of insight, Rinoa finally got the complete picture and soon marveled in its' complexity. _'Poor Squall…'_ She had last thought before talking aloud to herself looking through the windowpane.

"Wow… I didn't think that he was all that complex, I just though he was simply anti-social… Imagine losing both your sister and mother, no wonder he's so distant and cold. I wish that I could help break out of that shell, but he'd just reject me. At least he's gotten a bit better, I think... Who knows with him though, it's like he's under cloud of mystery or something… He's got nice blue-grey eyes though, when he's not glaring them at you that is…"

Deciding to try and not nauseate herself too much in thought, fearing that she'd become the next Squall, Rinoa tried to go to sleep. However her efforts were in vain as a few more things slipped into her brain, prohibiting sleep and causing more lights to turn on inside.

'_You know what? I don't really have it all that bad, at least I can try and fix things with my dad if really wanted to, but Squall…well he doesn't have that option, they're both gone and he can't do anything about that…and I'd think even if he began to see past that shell of his, it would be… so hard to break everything that he'd been sticking to for all of those years to be normal… It kinda makes me think that what I'm doing is…sorta childish… -I really should get some sleep now…_'

But instead of sleep, she lulled into a very recent flashback of what she'd said to Squall earlier today before she left.

"…**_Why don't you want to go home?" _**

"**_Family issues. I don't like him and he doesn't like me-"_**

"That's not really true…_isn't it?_ It's more like I hate him because he ignores me…Maybe my father really did mean what he said today…_but…_how could.. _I **be** sure of that?_ I don't know what to be sure of anymore…" She wondered aloud in response to the memory in her final moments of consciousness.

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The next morning Squall was in more of a rush than usual; he woke up 15 minutes late (forgot to set his alarm), he had to endure an icy-cold shower (his father 'forgot' to tell him that the water heater broke Monday morning), and to top it all off, the car was gone for some reason (grocery shopping at _7:00 am?_), so that meant that he had to dash to catch the bus or else he'd have to feign a mysterious illness to stay home until…about.. 9:39 am, and Squall was just about ready to do so… if the bus hadn't been 18 minutes late. He thanked Hyne that at least he'd packed his backpack the night before.

As he got on the bus, people halted their normal conversations as usual to be available to stare at his presence. The equation was simple to understand why they were all doing this, and the solution to balance this formula was to give them an equally icy glare back at them. Squall couldn't have imagined a more horrible morning even if he had the holy grail of horror books at his disposal.

'_They're all like this because I haven't taken the bus consecutively like this since the ninth grade, but why should that bother them? People are getter stranger every day, I swear…_' He thought after he'd finally taken an unoccupied seat.

"Hey Squall!" A voice shouted in his general direction, Squall assumed that it was directed to him for the obvious reasons so he calmly ignored it, figuring that answered it would only yield pointless conversation. Although he found it quite hard to ignore once the speaker fervently sat down right beside him.

'_What is she doing here? Rinoa doesn't take this bus… Well… I can't really be sure since I never take the bus in the first place… But why does she always do weird things like this? I mean, isn't there another seat she can invade…Doesn't she have any friends around or something… Why does it always have to be me?_'

"Squall, did you not get enough sleep or something? You look like you're two steps away from a coma."

'_Never quite get it, do you Rinoa._' He quipped internally for possibly the hundredth time today.

"…No." Squall monosyllabically replied to brush her off…again.

"Uh, you do realize that I was joking right?"

'_Oh yeah, I forgot, it's Squall research day and today we're now studying the Squall response mechanism! How stupid of me! What's next, an experiment to test my immune system?'_

"Hmm…" Rinoa observed during the lapse of speech, "…Judging by the glare set in your eyes an position of your hands… you're thinking of something sarcastic… Am I right?"

'_Dead on. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be ignoring you now just to annoy and throw you off… Can't you just leave me alone?_'

For the remainder of the trip, Squall kept peered towards the windows on his right, avoiding his seat-companion's gaze; eventually she did leave midway through, being completely peeved at the fact that chewed-up textbooks had more social skills than the window-mesmerized Squall Leonhart. Meanwhile, that said person was actually transfixed into his continuous thoughts and notions about the now-gone Heartilly.

'_I know that this sounds repetitive even to me, but, what is it about her that gets through my defenses? I mean that even when I do succeed at blocking me inner thoughts to her, how come it feels like I've failed? Another thing I wonder about is what draws her to me? Why is she putting all this effort in the first place to want to do all of this?_'

After that block of notions came to pass, as did the bus's trip to the school, students were leaving and as soon as Squall got out of this reverie, he realized that he was the only one still there, so he quickly exited as well.

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Once inside the school, Squall simply retreated to the library, as he usually did with his first period spare when it wasn't the S.D/Weaponry class. He usually did some reading or homework when necessary. Today, however, the library's ambiance and mood felt a little different for some inexplicable reason, or maybe it had to do with the people whispering to each other whenever they went past him. Finally, one of the conspirators got brave enough to approach him and **actually **say something.

"Is it …_true?_" The aforementioned male conspirator nervously squeaked, to Squall, it seemed like the boy must have been under the impression that he bit people's heads off if they tried to speak to him.

"…What's true?" Squall inquired, coming off as being a bit annoyed.

"That… _youwerelockedinsidewiththatgirlinsidetheschooltogether-_"

"…I _what?_"

"That y…ou… were stuck inside the school w..i…th that other black-haired girl…"

While wondering why in the world that scared little kid would even know about that, Squall replied very nonchalantly to his question with a 'Yes…', then after his inquiry was fulfilled, the boy somehow became braver, finally figuring out that the rumour of the head-biting was indeed false.

"Oh, see… But another rumour has it that you two also… 'hooked up' in that time as well, if you know what I mean… -_Was_ that also true?" The conspirator asked slyly, albeit very stupidly. This got Squall very angry as well, but somehow managed to resolve the untrue allegations without resolving to throw this guy against the wall.

"…No, and that'll never happen because I'm **not** that kind of person. Where did you hear that kind of stupid rambling?"

"…I overheard it from that guy… uhh… what's his name- …Captain of the football team…tall blonde guy…_um-_"

"-_Seifer Almasy?_" Squall interjected very acidly.

"Yeah, that's the guy! Sorry for bugging you… _I didn't mean to-"_

"…It's fine."

"Okay, bye…Gotta _go!_" The guy then sped out of the library and Squall resumed reading his novel, apparently when he answered all of those questions the other whisperers stopped their murmuring, possibly because they overheard the answers they sought. All of the natural serenity of the library was restored, but yet, Squall couldn't seem to focus on his book at the moment.

'_Seifer… I should have known that it was him behind that ridiculous rumour about Rinoa and me sleeping together… Although I could probably ignore something trivial like this, I just hope that Rinoa can take this sort of thing as well…err… -Because I really don't want a clingy basket case on my hands…Who am I kidding? What is it that causes me to always have to justify myself like this all of the time? I know that the clingy basket case part wasn't true but what am I trying to cover? My empathetic side? No, that doesn't sound right… Nevermind, I'd better start reading or else I won't be able to finish it in time…_'

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After the bell for the end first period rang, Squall was already scrolling towards his locker as the masses came from the various classrooms, filling up the previously bare hallway, he managed to spot a familiar face among the thousands, and it was speeding towards him. It was extremely easy to figure out who it happened to be.

'_I'm guessing she didn't take too well to that rumour…_' He noted mentally for a brief second.

"Squall, I need your help, everyone-"

"…is spreading a rumour that you and I, were fooling around?" He stated flatly, being unusually calm about the situation.

"…Yeah, that's more or less it… -_Hey,_ how did you know about it?"

"Lets' just say an individual came up and… bluntly asked me about that." Even in light of the situation, Rinoa burst out laughing once Squall had given her the explanation.

"He..he… came right up to you and said _that?_" She stopped talking as he simply nodded and when she had to stifle her giggling, "Well, that's pretty brave considering the person he's talking to…"

After Squall gave her that almighty glare of his for that one, she resumed on with her story.

"-Okay…I think… I think that I'm done laughing now. Anyways, it had started when I was at my locker this morning, I thought I had heard Seifer mentioning something about us, but I figured that I was only hearing things so I brushed it off and left. Later people were giving me odd looks and pretty soon they were shouting stupid things like '_So_ _did two really go all the way?', 'What was it like?', 'Did you actually make Leonhart crack?' _and other ridiculous things like that. So I was wondering what they meant by until Quistis informed me about the rumour that Seifer was saying about us. Whether it was a joke or not, I don't know, but all I do know is that it got much worse afterwards for me. …Now, I don't know if I can't take it anymore…"

"…Why don't you just ignore them, if you know that it's not true, is it not what matters?" Squall suggested to the emotionally-shaken girl.

"Thanks for trying, but I don't think that'll work very well. People are calling me horrible things like 'slut' and other stuff like that, and even though I try telling them otherwise, they won't believe me… If there weren't so many people saying it, I could take it, but with these numbers, I don't know anymore…"

At this moment, Squall was speechless, not because he chose to say nothing; he actually didn't know what to say. For the first time in his life, he let his ego aside and took the time to think a thought, not of complaint, but one of sorrow.

'_She's actually suffering at my hands… This is horrible. I was all worried about letting her in, that I've failed to notice that others are pushing her out… I don't care if it was Seifer who started the rumour, it's my fault he started it, he wanted to get back at me, so he's aiming for both of us…Why make a promise to let people out of your life if all you're doing is hurting them? I won't promise to break my vow to Ellone, but I will do something to get her out of this…I have to…_'

"...Is there anything that can be done?"

"No, not really," Rinoa lamented, "Unless if you can testify in front of the whole school that you didn't do me… But that's being very unrealistic. I suppose all that we can do is bear it, and if people ask, we just tell them the truth."

"…Sounds reasonable."

"Well, I need to get my stuff for Art. See you around Squall."

Right after she'd left for her locker, Squall gathered up his things for his own English Class in haste, not to be late, seeing as he only had 3 minutes left. When the bell rang for second period, Squall managed to just sit down in his third row seat. Needless to say, he had to endure a bit of questioning from some students - which he had no problem ignoring.

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That day in English went by pretty easily seeing as nearly everyone had received extra grammar worksheets as a consequence for handing in sloppy, error-filled short stories last Thursday. Meanwhile, Squall and that girl Rinoa was talking about earlier were left to help the teacher with various tasks, one which involved returning a television cart to the library. During the walk, she started to talk to him.

"I believe that you and Rinoa didn't do anything." She affirmed. Squall chose not to say anything and just continued to direct the cart.

'_That's great, now can you please convince the other 1000 students who think otherwise so I can get on with my life and have it restored to what it was, thank you very much._'

"I still can't believe Seifer would to something like this, even though it sounds like he was joking, I only thought that he was just cocky, but I guess not." Quistis added while steering the cart.

"…You'd be surprised of what that guy can do."

"…Out of curiosity, was he the one who gave you that scar?" Squall nodded and whispered to himself a scarcely audible, "…Yeah, that and a lot more…"

"Yeah, that was big news that day… I guess nothing ever goes easy for you, does it?"

"No…Not really…"

"I know that I may be talking a little too much but, you don't seem as cold and distant as people make you out to be-"

Squall stopped pushing the cart as hard and stared at her with a slightly subdued cold look.

"…What to do mean by that?" He inquired with a hint of irritation. She got the idea and stopped the cart to talk about it.

"Well, today you didn't give those death glares to everyone who came up to talk to you about the rumours. Also, when I passed by you and Rinoa, you looked a bit more sympathetic than usual. It seemed like something in that conversation was out of place for some reason. And you just seemed... _different_ today. Well… regardless of that, we should go and bring this cart back."

'_Have I really changed that much?' _

Right after they had successfully returned the cart, the bell rang as they were both retracing their steps to the English class to retrieve their things. Soon, all of the students scattered outside and went in their respective directions to their own lockers along with the teachers exiting their own classes for lunch. While Squall was the last to go back in to get his binder and pencil case, he noticed that inside there were several notes so he took the time to read them all. From what he could tell from the contents of the various scraps of paper, ignorant people were writing things about him and Rinoa that ranged from obscene to completely revolting. Right there, in the empty classroom, the adolescent crumpled up the last letter and slid his binder off the desk violently, and dropped the pencil case from his hand's grasp. He then slammed his arms onto the surface of his desk along with his head; he couldn't take it anymore, his resistance had depleted.

'_I can't do this… the picture they're painted of me is my exact opposite on every aspect- **I am not at all like this!** I …can't subject myself to this anymore… I need an escape. I… thought I was…stronger than this! Why…_'

At that point, Squall had recollected something on he had thought about yesterday morning.

'**_What should I do? I'm so confused… She knows too much already… What if she tells somebody else? To tell the truth... I worry too much about what others think of me. I hate that side of me... That's another reason why I didn't want anyone to get to know me. I wanted to hide that side of myself. I hate it. Squall is an unfriendly, introverted guy. It made it easy for me when people perceived me that way. But now, I don't know if I can continue like this…' _**

'…_Why can't I keep it that simple anymore? What caused the complication that's preventing me to revert to what it used to be? I mean, all that I have to do ignore everyone's stupid comments until they stop and forget about it, but no, it's the little flaw in my personality that's screwing it all up…No…Not now…Why…is that stupid migraine is coming back, I don't…think…I'll-_'

Squall's train of thought was interrupted by the severe onslaught of the migraine originating from the 4 day-old scar across the bridge of his nose, the effects this time round were downright more intensely excruciating compared to the other times by an extremely large margin. The pressure put on the adolescent was extremely rapid in contrast; he immediately clutched at his sides ardently, and quickly, the pain escalated, causing him to buckle from his previously-standing position and the intolerable agony forced him to vomit, and then he progressed to pass out within a matter of seconds. The chances were very slim in regards to someone discovering him before lunch, and right now with those odds, and his life was in peril.

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"Oh Hyne, Mr. Leonhart! Are you okay? This doesn't look good… **_HELP!_**" Mrs. Pine, the English teacher exclaimed in horror upon finding Squall out cold on the floor after her lunch break, when he wasn't responding to any of the jostling from her hands. After having no success, the professor swiftly flagged down Dr.Kadowaki from the teachers' lounge.

When they both got back, Dr. Kadowaki looked over the passed-out Leonhart and gave judgment on his status.

"Hmm…He doesn't look well at all, I won't be able to treat him properly with the supplies we've got in the school, so I'd advise that he should go the hospital. As fast as possible."

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'_Huh? What am I doing on a white bed again? This feels exactly like what happened on Friday, but I'm not in the infirmary, there isn't that adjacent bed…Am I in the hospital?_' Squall wondered as he was adjusting his eyes to the harsh white glare of the room, when his eyes focused, he saw Dr. Kadowaki, another doctor, and Mrs. Pine all surrounding him.

"…Why am I here? I remember passing out… but how come I'm in the hospital?" The bed-ridden Leonhart inquired. Then the unknown doctor started to talk about his medical history after he motioned for the other two to leave the area.

"…I'm reading your last file entry Mr. Leonhart and it says that you recently received a diagonal gunblade wound across… the bridge of your nose and that there would be no nerve or physical damage besides scar tissue, am I correct?"

"…Yes."

"Okay, there are some questions that I need answered before I can proceed any further on any diagnosis or treatments since you don't have a history of any specific medical problems, is that okay?"

"Sure."

"Okay, have you been subjected to any environments or health problems that might have weakened your immune system besides the blood loss from that prior injury?"

'_Yeah, nearly starving for 4 days being locked up in the school with Seifer and his 'posse' ganging up on me, so that's more blood loss… Would that lead to a weakened immune system? You bet it would, but seeing as you wouldn't believe that tale, I not going to be very specific…_'

"I hadn't been eating very well in the last… 3-4 days and I fell down the stairs and lost some more blood in the process, and I've been suffering from these kinds of migraines at less severe intensity sporadically near my scar. …Would that do it?"

"Oh yes… That would certainly do it, I'm just going to jot this down and you'll have to get on the scale to see how much damage was done since your records **do** indicate that you're constantly on the borderline for being underweight for your specific body frame. Will you carefully get out from your bed and go on that scale outside the room so I can record the number please, thank you."

After the process and the tabulations were done, the pair both went back into the room and the doctor resumed the questioning.

"_Hmm… a 5 pound loss from the checkup last month…at greater risk for being underweight and having an effect over the immune system…" _The doctor mumbled to himself before he actually talked to Squall, "There! Done with that, you're still at an okay range, just be careful that you don't do that again or else it might harm your immune system's effectiveness for fighting against illnesses."

'_That's weird; I've always been pretty healthy even though I've always been lighter than the doctor's recommended… I wonder if they were all quacks? Heh… that kind of reminds me of what Rinoa said about me when I suggested what to do about our limited food supply when we were first stuck… Hey- why did I bring that up?_'

"Okay, Mr. Leonhart, last question, have you been subjected to any badly executed magic? What I'm talking about is anything where the spell-caster may have accidentally combined the spell with the effects of another."

"…Well, I've had fire spell and curative spells performed against me… Would any of them apply under what you've said?"

"No, I'm sorry, I meant a status inducing spell - those are the only ones known to have the magical properties that can be cross-contaminated with other spells."

"Not that I know of."

"Well, I'm going to take a precautionary measure and give you some low-dosage medicine that counteracts the effects of secondary spell poisoning, because judging by your symptoms, it seems like that's what's been ailing you, taking in the factors of a weakened immune system stemming from recent malnutrition and substantial blood loss. I'll call your father to pick you up and give him the information and medicine you require. In the meantime, you'll need to take it easy and rest."

Squall nodded in agreement and lied down on the hospital mattress in contemplation.

'_I was poisoned? And Seifer wasn't to blame for this? That's a first, usually he's the only who has always caused any suffering since the day we met – well, except when my father takes the car on short notice, but that's besides the point… But what I really wonder about is what could have caused all of this, not just the secondary poisoning, but for everything, like why had Mrs. Edea forgotten us? Why did Seifer make us suffer even more when he'd already had gotten his revenge when he had the advantage in that fight? And why do I always have trouble shaking off thoughts of -Hmph, I guess I'll never get those answers… I might as well rest… _'

After the sleeping adolescent had roughly an hour's sleep, his father came into the room and started flicking different spots on his face in order to get him to wake up.

"Wake up sleeping beauty, we've got to go. The hospital needs this bed for a man coming in for treatment who received a severe Moomba bite to _his-_ …well I'm not going to say what, but they still need the bed for that poor fellow, so you've to get a move on. C'mon Squall…" Laguna explained. Oddly enough, it was in a very humorous tone.

"_Erm…" _Squall mumbled groggily before sitting up properly, "…_Why_ do you always have to flick my nose?"

"-Because that's the only way to get you to wake up since you sleep like a brick. Okay, c'mon now, we've really got to get a move on, the man will be here any minute, so get changed in your normal clothes and we'll go."

'_Geez, I think he forgot about the part about me being sick too… Oww… I hate it when he flicks me like that…_'

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During the course of the trip back home, there was an awkward silence between the both father and son; and that was very unusual since Laguna normally talked too much for that to happen, so he turned the non-existent conversation to one about the medicine Squall would been receiving.

"Well it looks like you'll be missing only one day of school because the doctor told me that you'll need some rest and the medicine has a drowsy effect at first. Heh, I can already imagine the reaction of your secretary when I'll call to justify your absence," He paused for a moment to get ready to make fun of what he'd say to the school's secretary, " '_Hello, this is Mr. Loire speaking to justify my son's absence at school today, yeah, he somehow managed to get poisoned and the medication he'll be taking won't allow him to stay awake so he'll just stay home today, thanks, bye.' _"

When Laguna had a moment to grin at his son during a traffic delay, Squall countered it simply with a glare and a simple retort of, '_Don't…_'. His father found this amusing and continued talking when the temporary blockage of cars had cleared.

"I wasn't going to do that you know. Even though I'm a goof of a father, I know better than to not protect your privacy. Hyne, imagine if I didn't, remember when you were 12 and you managed to-"

"…Can we not relive that story, right now I'd be 1000 shades of red from embarrassment if I weren't feeling so run-down at the moment, okay?"

"Okay, I understand, I was just trying to lighten things up, that's all. Squall, sometimes you're too uptight for your own good… Now how are you ever going to get a girl with an attitude like that? Although that Rinoa girl seemed awfully-"

"-Will you **please** get off my case about her! I hear enough of that at school, _okay?_" Squall interrupted angrily.

"Hear _what_ at school? Does she like you or something?" Laguna teased, knowing that bugging him about anything personal always worked to tick his son off to no end.

"NO! It's not like that. …By the way, you just missed the house."

"Oops, better turn around. Now as soon as we're inside the house, I want you to go directly to your room to sleep after you've had something to eat and taken your meds, okay?" Squall nodded in agreement.

'_This must have been the first time he actually wants me to stay in my room; he usually wonders why I stay in there so much… But then again, I've never been poisoned before have I?_' The brown-haired teen thought ironically before getting out of the car towards his house.

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A few days after Squall had made a successful recovery and ridding himself of the unnatural poisoning that was plaguing him, things at school returned to normal. Now, very few people were giving the pair of former captives' suggestive stares, and all of those people were the ones who took, what Seifer claimed to be a joke, far too seriously.

Meanwhile, the others came to the full realization to who they were talking about, figuring that Squall wasn't that easy to crack in 'that' way and that he'd probably never come close to doing anything like that until maybe receiving a kiss by the age of 40 from a senile grandma mistaking him for her own husband. Rinoa found that second conclusion to be downright hilarious while Squall wondered who put in the 'senile grandma' part. He never did get an answer, though.

Anyways, both Rinoa and Squall were relieved about the shroud covering their details of their predicament had lifted into clear image of truth. Even though nearly everyone now knew about the part that they were locked inside, it didn't bother them one bit and even worked to give them some sympathy among most of the student populace, although it did manage to stir up questions among the school personnel. The vice principal disclosed on the subject and said that it was a 'very, very, very unlikely occurrence and that they shouldn't bother thinking about it if the parents of both students weren't going to press charges'. Laguna's only worry that concerned the school was when he was unable to function properly for a day after he completely cracked up over the 'senile grandma' part when Squall told him about what happened to him at school.

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While waiting for the bus Friday morning (The car had a motor problem), Squall started to ponder about something.

'_I must be getting used to taking the bus in the morning, I'm never late anymore, and people seem to not have that urge to stare at me anymore. Hmm, looks like an improvement here.'_

After embarking onto the designated school vehicle, the now-adapted adolescent took his newly normal seat at the back, waiting for the perfect moment to take out the new novel he'd become engrossed in lately. Right now, every thing seemed perfect; things were back to normal, nobody bugged him, and he was essentially now free to live his life to the way he'd been accustomed to, and to Squall, it felt very nice.

Actually, almost everything went back to normal. There only one difference, and it started with a 'R' and ended with an 'inoa'.

At her stop, she was heading towards the seat across from him. Right before she reached the back row, Squall found that perfect opportunity to open that 'engrossing book' and acted as if he were deeply submerged in the analysis of each syllable printed on the page. Although the book **was** interesting read, he found it increasingly difficult to ignore the currently-sitting Heartilly. Everyone near Squall pretty well knew what was really going inside his head but falsely-reading teen couldn't figure this out for himself, or simply wouldn't _allow_ himself to realize the feeling he was experiencing because he subconsciously knew that if he did, he would have broken his promise to his departed sister, and then some.

Whatever the case, whatever he was trying wasn't really working out anymore.

"So… I never got around to asking you, why weren't at school Wednesday? Were you trying to dodge the masses?" Rinoa asked during the moment he put his book down to rub his eyes.

'_Well I can't get out of this one, can I? I probably should tell her what happened or she'll be hounding me forever…'_

"…Well, you know how during the weekend how I… sometimes fell _ill_…" He paused for a second to let her nod and to try and phase the next part with some dignity, "…well it happened again, but it was very severe this time and I …"

"Actually… Squall, I know about that part, Mrs. Pine ran right past me with Dr. Kadowaki talking about the problem."

'_Oh great, so she knows about how I threw up and blacked out, there goes my dignity out the window. Might as well tell her the rest…_'

"…Well, then they must have brought me to the hospital since I somehow woke up there and it turns out that I was poisoned from a cross-contaminated status spell…I just …stayed home on doctor's orders."

After that, the only response that Rinoa could spit out was, "_Oh my…_" before they returned to their respective things.

When the bus had stopped at the school somewhat later, after Squall and the others had all come out from the bus, he noticed that Rinoa had speedily dashed past him, while nearly grazing his arm, to meet up with her female friends. He thought nothing of this considering her social nature, but something was naturally picking at the back of his mind about the last comment she'd said to him. He often cursed his habits of over-analyzing every little detail. As he walked towards the library to read his novel, he started to ponder once more on his lack of self-control.

'_Okay, this is getting stupid, even though I keep telling myself to stop thinking about everything little thing she does, it still plagues me. Ever since the lock-in, there hasn't been a night or day where I haven't thought about her for some little thing, whether she was ticking me off, or just simply thinking about something she did or said. I know now what this must mean, but I … can't do it. I just can't, that could mean breaking my promise but, now that I think of it, would Ellone want for me to be isolated like this? She probably wouldn't, but then, who was I making to promise to then?_'

The question Squall asked himself was answered within a matter of a split-second by the logical part of his brain.

'-_Myself. I just used the promise to make it easier to keep myself distant and never risk losing anyone dear to me, not because of Ellone. …I'm so sorry, sis… I was only afraid of any comfort getting taken away like that again… Well, eventually people do die, just some pass away faster than others, and that just happened from chance… it was an accident… Hyne, I'm so stupid! _'

'_Maybe I ended doing the very thing I was trying to prevent by not letting anyone in… I was hurting myself more by denying my feelings- err…it still feels odd admitting that…rather than just maybe accepting them, even if I wasn't planning to do anything about it. Okay, so I've gotten that off my chest, but what now? I can't say much to Rinoa or else she'd probably have a heart attack, but… at least I can admit to myself that I think that I lo-_'

"You _actually_ put a sleep spell on him Friday afternoon, and he got sick because _it?_" Selphie inquired (at a much higher volume than the library normally tolerated) to Rinoa in the library among her circle of close friends. Once the dark-haired girl turn around for a moment when she heard a book drop, her face went bright fire-engine red realizing Squall was staring at them, jaw agape. After overhearing Selphie talking, err, shouting to Rinoa, he had a change in his thoughts before taking in the full dimension of what it meant.

'…_I think that I lo-athe her…_'

"Wait! You don't understand, _come back Squall!_" Rinoa pleaded desperately.

He waited for no one, he simply pick up his book and strode out furiously and never looked back.

'_This is **exactly **why I didn't bother to open up to anyone… and thanks to you Rinoa, I never will, ever again…_'

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**End of chapter comments – **I can bet that you weren't expecting that one; did you?

Anyways, I hope that answered some questions meanwhile possibly creating new ones. Although I can't really promise when it'll be done since you guys probably guessed that I'm really an off-and-on writer, but the next chapter will be the conclusion to the story because it would be too hard to put it all in this chapter. Even though I might just be speculating, but the final chapter might not be as long, but keep looking for that update you'll never know, I might be able to pull it off. Now, it's time for that trademark sentence…

…Keep on reviewing with ideas, comments or anything you guys have to say! Thanks a billion you guys!


	7. Chapter VII – Conflict and Absolution

**Author's note –** Another chapter done, another to go, I can't wait to write it! Hee!

**_-Author screams like a little school girl-_**

Okay, since this **will **be the last installment of the _Locked Inside_ series, I'm going to make it my job to be really hard on myself to making it up to you readers by writing this last chapter so good that you'll be crying at the end because it's over. And since I didn't know until someone had told me that answering reviews publicly on the chapters weren't allowed anymore, I won't be answering them after the usual author's note like I used to.

However, I'll be happy to answer anything you guys write to me via e-mail (my address is in my profile).

Okay, so since that's been cleared, I think that it's appropriate to start the ending now (Geez… that sounded like an oxymoron…), so…

…**_Here it is! _**

_P.S : If you find yourself getting depressed that it's going to be over, just read it really slow so it'll last that much longer!_

– **_Just kidding around guys, and ignore the crazy author!_**

_**Edit (09/07/06) –** Just fixed some typos and formatting errors._

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**Chapter VII – Conflict & Absolution**

As soon as he marched out of that unbearable hell hole, Squall found his eyes burning from the lie he'd plainly adopted as a simple truth. How dare Rinoa cause him to go through so much anguish, suffering and deceit? Although he knew deep down that the secondary poisoning wasn't intended by any means, the venom he'd mistaken as personal weakness caused him far more effective torment and chagrin than any physical infliction of pain toxin would ever do.

After a moment's reflection, the various bits of the prior unexplainable past became swiftly pieced together and fused to create the simplistic, basic solutions and answers that continued to increase the now-isolated Leonhart's humiliation furthermore and cause his near-breakdown in the desolate corridor. Now, the former burning sensation had shifted into a glassy reserve of unshed tears in the troubled stormy-blue depths of his eyes; much like the foreshadowing dark clouds before the rainfall.

"_**Squall, thank goodness you're awake!" **_

'_-No, it should be more like, 'You finally woke up, it's about time already!' '_

"_**Something bad has happened!"** _

'_Yeah, and I'm Mr. Sociable…_'

"**_I was afraid that we were going to be stuck inside this room for the whole weekend..."_**

"**_I guess Mrs. Edea was too excited about the long weekend and completely forgot about us! Weird huh?"_**

"… **_I left my cell at home; I thought I wouldn't need it today." _**

'_No, you had planned it all… And what did you do about Mrs. Edea? Bribe her in smiles?'_

"**_Well, unless if we can find some kind of phone, we'll just have to survive the weekend inside the school."_**

"**_Okay… That's not the kind of answer I was expecting, but it'll do. Then I guess we just have to explore the school then make our solution accordingly after we're done exploring. Right?"_**

'_Not the kind of answer you were looking for? Don't make me laugh. It seems to me that it was your stinkin' goal all along – scratch that, making out was the ultimate prize you were searching. Well good luck with that, you'd have better chance with a corpse than with me.'_

'**_She must be slightly scared with anticipation of the possible outcome. Who wouldn't? The phone could possibly not work at all. Hyne, lets just hope that it does…'_**

'_What kind of drugs was I high on to think of **that? **No..no..no… The question should be why I don't have them now to numb all of this…'_

"**_We're going to have go to Plan B, the phone itself was dead." _**

'…_I'm not going to even answer that one…'_

"**_Squall, were free! Your father and the vice principal found me, so we can finally leave now that I've found you!"_**

'_You know what? I think that was the finest acting I've seen in my life, either that or you'd just stopped trying._'

Even, after he'd been sardonically analyzing everything, it still didn't help ease the pain what so ever, thoughts continued to scathe him and had begun to envelop his entire being in one hazy thought, a single notion that would not stop hurting.

'_Despite the dishonesty and everything, I'd like nothing more than to want to hate her forever, but I can't seem to put myself up to it. There's always been something, a figurative spark about her that infuriates me yet pulls me towards her at the same time… In my mind, I was always suppressing it, because I knew that deep inside, it would only bring me the same turmoil and heartbreak when my sister and mother died… but even so, I can still remember all the times during the weekend where even I've confessed that there was something about her kept on… plaguing my thoughts on both sides of the spectrum, but what should I do** now?** I know that what I do on the outside and think on the inside sometimes end up appearing like two completely different planes of thought - even to myself - …but this time, it's not about appearances or perceptions anymore, it's simply figuring out **what **I want to do with this situation… and that, I really don't know… Hyne, I wish I knew…_'

After that, he got up slowly, not realizing that he'd been sitting down with back against the nearby wall in a deep, trying contemplation the entire time. A moment passed thereafter. He was rubbing his eyes to eliminate the traces of a previous emotion, but it wasn't necessary. They were burning up once more as he saw the subject of his infliction running towards him from the other extremity of the corridor, and he had made up his mind.

"What do you _want?_" He stated very harshly.

"I've been…trying to find you…and-" She stopped to collect herself and catch her breath as well, "…to explain why I did what I had done to do you. If you'll let me, that is."

"…Fine, but I'm in no position to be forgiving."

'_I only want to know what possessed you to have done this. Hyne forbid if I even bother to think about forgiving you.'_

"That's okay. I was expecting you to be like this anyway… To start off, I didn't really mean to poison you by that spell, I just sometimes have trouble with casting status and curative spells. Also, in case if you were wondering, that was the real reason why I didn't want to tell you about what I had done when you had first fainted. I knew all along that cure spells were allowed, but I figured that you might have not known that as well and I thought… it would be the best thing to say instead of the truth. I didn't want to scare you."

'_Yeah, but you'll lie freely about us being forgotten and locked in by accident…' _Squall sarcastically denoted in his head.

"-Getting on with the story, and excuse me if I'm being really forward, because I can tell that you'd had enough of that when we were locked up, but… the only reason I did all of this, I mean put a sleep spell on you and make it seem like we had been both fallen asleep and forgotten was because… in truth, because it was an opportunity to get to _know_ you."

'_I don't believe this…_'

"Before you think I'm a complete psychopath, let me explain myself better. You and I actually **had** fallen in and out of sleep a couple of times from the ungodly warm temperature in that empty room, but the difference was that I had woken up when the last bell rang and that's when I heard Mrs. Edea in class. After she was asking that everyone to hand in the tests and whatnot, I overheard her saying that she'd needed everyone to leave 'promptly' because she had to go to an important appointment after school. That's when I realized that she assumed that we had heard the bell and left too. So in a way, we were _sort _of forgotten."

'_So it wasn't exactly a lie, and if we'd actually **been** sleeping all that time, this would have happened regardless. Still, I can't forgive her for doing all of this, and what the hell went in her head that convinced herself to follow through?_'

"-But since you were stirring and about to wake up any moment now, even though it might sound completely and utterly ridiculous, I acted on impulse and put the sleep spell on you and then another on myself. I did this because I've always…_I've…always-"_

'_Okay, why are you stumbling like this Rinoa? You had no problems before, especially with starting off with that lengthy paragraph to possibly start…your- I don't know… Please, just say it; I'm sure that whatever it can't be nearly as bad as you most likely think it is…_'

"I've always…had a thing for you," She paused to uncharacteristically look down at her feet for a moment, while Squall eyed her with a perplexed look.

When she finally got up the courage to continue, a trying, almost forced smile was now present on her blush-tinged face.

"…ever since I saw you standing against that wall alone at that one school dance, after I had came to this school in grade ten." The story went a little more flow and ease for Rinoa as she regained her usual confidence, albeit it's deeper contents. "You had always seemed… different from the others… Very introverted and mysterious, but it wasn't just that that intrigued me. I've seen my share of shy and anti-social guys over the years, but with you, I could feel that it was much deeper than that, and… I've come to grow more aware of it during those past days we spent trapped inside the school…"

When she'd been done admitting these secrets to the individual it was intended for, there was a natural pause to transition from the previous subject. Rinoa carefully used this time to see a possible reaction from Squall, but unfortunately, she wasn't able to distinguish anything in that frame of a couple seconds without causing an awkward silence by prolonging it. Her heart would have to wait for its' answer a little while longer.

"At first, I felt very guilty for taking advantage of the position we were in, but when you seemed calm about the situation after you woke up, while we were going downstairs to get to the office, those feelings just… disappeared somehow when I was genuinely surprised that office phone didn't work. I had been convinced ahead of time that I'd have to lie to you about it not working."

'-_So that's why she looked strangely relieved when she put the phone down…_'

"Then, however, I went really giddy for nearly no reason other than coming to the conclusion that my plan worked and you thought that this was just a really unlucky accident. It's also the reason why I'd been really fanatical with you at first, but as you might know, I toned down a bit since I now knew that being **that** forward never sits very well with you. And well… I'm sorry that I put you through all this unexpected harm for my own personal gain, I should have taken in consideration your current health from what Seifer must have done to you in that duel. So… that's all that I can say right now…" Rinoa nearly concluded, trying to refrain from telling him that she knew about his mother and sister, because the last thing she wanted was to keep from getting him angrier than he probably was. "I'm just really sorry Squall…"

He stood there, focused onto Rinoa's pleading, bittersweet expression, radiating from the gleam in her eyes, scanning them with a glare, not of malice, but one of secret wondering. In reality, he didn't feel as angry as he thought he would, but he didn't feel sympathetic either, and the part of the tale that was angering him wasn't angering him in what he'd call a 'traditional' sense, but rather in a sense that he couldn't even begin to describe right now. However, whatever it was, caused him to break connection to her gaze and swiftly leave in what he thought to be in frustration.

Rinoa had continued to stand still, not daring to give chase. She'd known that she'd already lost him.

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The day had eventually passed, albeit very slowly. People attended their classes as usual, while others skipped, and generally everyone lived life as normally as they did on any other given Friday. Squall and Rinoa did as well, but to a lesser extent. While Rinoa feigned not having any problems (…and who wouldn't be doing that in her situation? She'd **actually** summoned up the courage to even tell the infamous Squall Leonhart how she felt and had gotten badly rejected. How would somebody else feel about telling others in her place?) and Squall started to act up and draw back into his former habits of seclusion. Neither one of them was happy, but that was the price they paid since they shared a connection with another human being, and they had both learned the hard way.

After the last bell had rung, the latter of the two gathered up his textbooks, among other things, and left soundly without even a thought. He'd even received news during that period that he had achieved the highest test score of the class and he still left without any emotion. This very recent resolution that he'd made to prohibit himself from feeling things ultimately was starting to worry his classmates, teachers, and furthermore, the school staff.

But alas, he thought nothing of it.

As he sat on the bus, waiting for the ride home, he observed his surroundings very intently. The teenager wasn't in a very good mood to say the least, and his scowl showed it physically to those around him. Even before the long weekend had ever taken place, he'd never been in such a foul disposition without any provocation in his life. But luckily for the others, not a single word was said to him to further the squalor.

'_I've had enough; I can't stand the liveliness of this Hyne-forsaken bus any longer. Where's the moron of a driver to get this thing moving? Screw it, I'm walking…'_

He immediately acted upon his impulsive thoughts and left his seat and the bus all together, and when the much-older bus driver did show up near the side of the bus to get to the inside, and asked Squall the politely phrased question of, '_So are you going to be on or off today, Squall?_' he turned slowly and answered back in a somewhat indecent, '_No, I'm not… and probably never will be._'

"Sorry to hear that. I hope you'll change your mind sooner or later boy." The elderly man cheerily added, oblivious of the coarse tone as the adolescent started to trudge along the sopping wet sidewalks.

After walking in route for awhile, Squall's expression soured further, if at all possible, upon mentally calculating that he would not be home well into the supper hours. An exact 2 hours after he was expected to arrive home if somebody wanted to be very precise about it. But he shrugged it off and figured that his father wouldn't really get worried because he always came much later anyways.

Assuming that the time that Laguna would be home remained the same, Squall estimated that he could manage a little time in the downtown mall along the way; before it got too dark to walk to his house on the other end of the city, that is.

During these times, the walking teen was indeed thankful for his time management and assessment skills, and very much so when he could smell the familiar strangely inviting scent of roasting coffee beans wafting from the Balamb donut shop, meaning that he was very close where his new destination was.

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Once inside, he found solace in the much more temperate artificial climate through the shopping center's entrance doors. Actually, with completely soaked pants and shoes, he'd consider any place dry his asylum. After the initial spell of relief stopped to overwhelmingly soothe Squall's mindset, he started to amble towards the only thing that he liked about the large vicinity of commercial space – the local book store.

Passing by the numerous stores and stands, he'd finally got to the book shop where he browsed around to find a clerk, looking to see if the order he'd placed a while ago had finally came. After waiting several minutes, very impatiently mind you, for the only employee in the store to stop talking with a clueless middle-aged man who didn't know what he should buy his wife, Squall decided to look around at the new-arrival section of the store. Needless to say he wasn't impressed as he eyed the selection for a brief moment before ultimately gravitating to the mystery/suspense section nearby.

'_Meh… all there seemed to be there were those completely unrealistic Harlequins and other types of sappy mushy crap.' _He pondered pessimistically, while sifting through the thicket of novels. He continued to think on the subject in general.

'_Why do people buy into such stupid ideals? Shouldn't authors be a little more creative than that if they're absolutely **forced** to come in contact with the romance genre? At least add better twists or maybe a deeper plot… Maybe make it a more realistic or something… Nah, continuous heartbreak is the only realistic thing about love anyways… People sure wouldn't want to read depressive things like that, just fantasy worlds they can escape in. I'd better remind myself never to become an author… I've had enough of this. If that damn cashier isn't done with that guy, I'm leaving right now._'

Seeing as the girl had indeed stopped trying to convince the balding confused man to buy a cookbook for his spouse, Squall headed directly to ask her about the order he'd made 2 weeks ago had gotten to the store yet. As he waited while she checked the back room, he stayed somewhat sedentary, looking at the knick-knacks for sale, while tapping his fingers in boredom on the counter. Time passed rather slowly during the wait so the stationary standing position was ditched in favor of roaming around the perimeter near the cashier's station. Which included the right-side current best-sellers' wall, the carrousel of bookmarks and the magazine racks.

While pacing around the said area, his eyes suddenly caught a glimpse of an interesting sight. No it wasn't the female clerk coming back with his stack of books, although that interested him too, it was someone he'd never guess to be in book store (it was looking in the humour section) in a million… no- make that billion years.

And out of curiosity, no, it wasn't Seifer either.

However, that person **did** prompt Squall to speed up and pay for his miniature library of novels and hurry his pace to get out of the store, so that they wouldn't make eye contact with each other. Just to be certain that he'd evaded her right before leaving, he looked back once. She wasn't in the aforementioned humour section.

He was slightly uneasy about the disappearance, but when he realized that she was right behind him (he automatically looked backwards from hearing a 'thump' behind him), picking up the book she'd dropped, at that very fraction of a second, he was taken by surprise, shell-shocked and relieved at the same time.

'_Hyne, I swear I'm getting paranoid as the days go by, the moment I see someone **look** like her I go all panicky and unnerved…What'll happen to me if I actually **do** see her sometime? Maybe I'm just tired and that this is a sign. Besides what would be the reasoning for having these kinds of palpitations by simply seeing her? I've just got to put my act together and forget about her and what happened and put it in the past. Besides, there's no point in getting all worked up over nothing anyway… I really should have thought this through though… Now it's going to take me twice as long to get home with this load of books to carry. Better get moving or else I won't get home until twilight._'

Continuing on his trek homewards, while dampening his pant legs and shoes furthermore, Squall found it harder and harder to push on like this, not because of the charge he'd been carrying the entire time, that happened to be stowed safely in his black knapsack, but because he felt slightly under the weather (no pun intended) or at the very least, annoyed by the conditions he was subjected to while walking (slush, freezing rain, surprisingly deep puddles, etc.), but as he eventually saw his house looming closer in the distance, he stopped harping on about it. Even if his lower half was starting to really irritate him and his overall mood.

After a while, he did manage to get home… eventually.

After he unlocked and entered through the door, not even a second later his father came through that same door and nearly toppled over him. The best slapstick comedy couldn't even start to compare against the execution in this situation.

"Oops, sorry Squall, didn't see you there. Bus come late?" Laguna apologized.

'_It's 5:39 pm you clod, it couldn't possibly **be **this late…_'

"…No, I walked home." Squall replied plainly, void of any emotion as always.

"Oh, that must have been hard, wasn't it raining around _4 o'clock? _Why didn't you just take the bus or call someone for a ride if you just missed it?"

"It's not like that, I wanted to walk."

"Okay… Well, to each his own I suppose. I'd rather have you take the bus though… Anyways, I don't suppose you want supper just yet Squall?" He gave his father a peculiar stare for that last remark.

'_What do you think?_' He thought very crossly in response.

"That's what I thought. Well, you'll have to wait until later; I accidentally squished the groceries…"

Later that night, while trying to finish the last of his math homework at his desk, Squall found that the all-over, cold-like weariness and aches he'd experienced while dragging his feet home earlier was starting to reoccur again, along with some nasal stuffiness. Since this was detracting his mind from math equations, he decided to call it a night.

'_I'm not really feeling the greatest… I suppose that I should stop doing homework for now and go to bed…_' he lastly thought before dozing off completely.

The lethargy persisted even past the next morning when Squall guessed that it would have stopped by. After he slept nearly all day and was barely capable of doing anything. His father was somewhat concerned about his health, assuming that the medicine he'd taken earlier in the week might have induced other side effects. A quick trip to the doctor's ruled that out, stating that it was just a 'bout of a cold starting up. With that said, once they got home, the freshly-sick adolescent regressed to his bed to sleep for the remainder of the weekend except when he had to go to the bathroom, take some medicine, or eat something. Overall, he wasn't too happy about this happening and embittered his outlook over the next couple of days, including when he went to school Monday.

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The next morning unavoidably came too soon as the teenager slammed his hand to stop the infernal beeping from his alarm. Squall slowly forced himself to get up, knowing that he still suffering from the cold, but well enough to be aware that he'd still have to go to school. He groaned at the prospect of this. Squall had come to learn very quickly that, when he contracted colds, sleep was worth more to him than anything else in the world (You'd name it; he'd still be sleeping in bed).

After he'd gotten out of his room, Squall found it to take at least twice as long to do anything, not because of his symptoms, but because it was rooted from the different things he'd been thinking about. He'd love to say that he was too sick to attend school, but not in his lifetime would he'd be prepared to blow off classes like that. Lying wasn't one of his strong points, nor was missing school for false reasons. It was true that he was still sick, but not enough to warrant staying home. As soon as he went downstairs, the teenager immediately wished that he had chosen to fake his death, since the cheerful attitude and the joshing from his father was enough to drive him insane.

"So how are we feeling today, need to stay home?" Laguna asked cheerfully.

'_Oh no… There's no way in **hell** I'm staying here, next thing I know, you'll be doing puppet shows to cheer me up… I still have nightmares the last time you did that… _'

"…Fine, I can still go to school." Squall answered quickly, avoiding any complications that silence would have caused.

"Hmm…You sure? You sound a little stuffed up and look very tired."

"…No, I'm okay."

"Oh well, if you're going to be that adamant about it, just take it easy then."

'_Worse come to worse, I'll get everyone else sick then no one else will be at school the next day… Nah, that'd be a **good** thing._' Squall thought evilly.

After the somewhat sick adolescent couldn't stomach anymore of his breakfast, he traveled upstairs to get his backpack and keys, after passing through the stairs and bathroom, he'd caught a fleeting reflection of himself and noticed the paleness of which his father must have been referring to and got him to thinking for a few seconds.

'_That doesn't look good, maybe I should stay home…Nevermind, it'll go away, besides I have that test in Math… But what will people think? Argh…I have to stop doing that! I'm not supposed to think about what others think. It's just so… so…irrelevant, and unnecessary, and I'm only making things worse! Hyne, I hate it when I do that… I've got to let it go…like Friday, then no one will bother me then…everything will be better, it'll just… go away… But why won't it? Why won't **I** let it? I should really stop doing this._'

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After arriving to the school and entering through its' doors, Squall directed himself towards to the library. While it was nearly a repeat performance from Friday in the manner of how he got there, when he finally got inside, it was the polar opposite. The library was so calm and serene that, Squall had no problems in doing the homework he'd failed to do due to his ailment on the weekend. The only problem was that the rest of the day didn't pass like this at all.

'_Okay, Math is done, I've got that extra reading assignment finished for History, I guess I'm all caught up… I suppose I have some time to read something from the library. Maybe something suspenseful…_'

As soon as Squall found a novel that deemed to be potentially interesting from the library's computer filing system, he strode forwards and had taken a right towards the English literature section. Swiftly scanning the titles for the book he was interested in, he found several other appealing novels as well. This greatly distracted his search for the original one he was looking for, and before he knew it, the bell had rung.

'_Hmm… I should take the green and red ones, no time to find that first book I was looking for… That second one doesn't seem interesting, anything with a jerk as a main character always ends up where he learns to be considerate and falls for the popular girl…On second thought, I'd better put back the-_'

At that moment Squall froze, as he saw through the metal shelves, a quiet figure reading intently. When he caught the sight of her, she had realized that the bell had gone off and started to get up from her chair. So, he put a cold look to prevent her from trying to start anything with him. However, every so often it cracked when he felt as if her eyes were looking at his back. But once she sped past him, she was the one giving off false looks of anger; and he knew them to be false because every time she turned back where he couldn't see her face, he heard nearly-silent sobbing in front of him. After this, he wasn't feeling very well, whether it was his cold acting up or something else, he wasn't sure of at the moment.

He also couldn't fully understand why this was happening, with Rinoa acting in the way that she did, and he wasn't about to try and find out today. He had other things, more important things, he had to do.

He walked out of the room silently but found his pace a bit fast and frequently found himself closer than he wanted to be near Rinoa. Tired of the distance (or lack of) between himself and her, he decided to just plainly go on another route to get to his locker. He cursed upon his odd phobia of her when he was nearly marked late (he'd just squeaked in when the bell rang) because the path he took had taken much longer.

"Nice to see you Mr. Leonhart, I was starting to wonder if you well enough to attend class. Please, take a seat now." Mrs. Pine sharply remarked, causing a couple of jerks in the class to laugh at him, knowing about the spell of illnesses that had kept him from several English classes. Squall wasn't amused one bit, but then again, who would be?

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, if you'll stop laughing for a moment and turn your attention towards the boards, you'll notice the grid I've drawn here. See the column with the grade percentages in each box? Make note of the numbers in the next column beside the various grade ranges. These numbers are the amount of people whose grade falls under each category. Now, if you'll notice the rows that denote students who have an average inferior to seventy percent, it is downright pitiful. I expect better than this, ladies and gentlemen! We've got to work twice as hard if we're going to change this around by exam time, I do not want to see only six students out of twenty-seven receive acceptable marks!"

A scared student's hand quivered upwards after the speech, and when the teacher allowed her to talk, her question suffered greatly from nervousness. Squall was thankful that he was not one of the people who Mrs. Pine was directing her shouting at.

"…_W_ill there be any extra programs to help… those… who really want t..o… improve if students just can'_t…_ figure things out _–Not…_ because they're **lazy**-"

"Yes, students who genuinely want to improve just have to come see me at lunch. Any more _questions?_ It doesn't have to be only the ones who need extra help. _Anyone?_" For some reason, Mrs. Pine seemed to be implying for Squall to ask a question. So he did – a very ill-mannered one; he wasn't in a mood to be very polite today with everything going on.

"…Do you intend on giving the class more work?"

"Yes, but only to aid certain people to work on weaker subjects. For example, I'll be giving extra worksheets time-to-time on punctuation, grammar or sentence structure."

His hand shot up again.

"So what are you going to do about the people who don't need it?"

"Well, they'll just have to complete it like the rest of the group." This time he didn't wait to put his hand up.

"…So, you're punishing those of us who are achieving well for no reason?"

"Well even the students who **do** manage to achieve well, can still ameliorate in some areas like those who aren't."

"But isn't that demoralizing students by classifying them in that way? …They're not all achieving badly because of laziness; some try and just can't get the higher marks." That's when Mrs. Pine had enough of Squall's analyzing, and was very vocal about it.

"Now Mr.Leonhart, that's enough. I've had it up to my ears with _your…_your… cynical remarks, and I'm surprised you would have said such unpleasant things… Now for the rest of the students, who aren't going to attack my work plan, turn to page 72 and read the short story entitled 'Silence isn't always Golden' by J. A. Nottingsworth. "

'_You asked for it… It's wrong to say things like that. Just because they aren't the most high-achieving students, doesn't mean that they're no good…A grade doesn't show everything about your personality and character. It's kind of like the idea of good and bad,_ _it's only different standpoints, perspectives that separate people. Both sides blame one another. There's no good or bad side. Just two sides holding different views._'

After English class had eventually ended, Squall headed for the lunchroom among the others. Nothing really happened during this period, as he sat down, ate his lunch and quietly retreated to take some medicine for his cold, and then started to read his newly-borrowed novels in the library. No dilemmas here.

'_Hmm… This is turning more interesting with every page I read. Wonder where it'll go on to next…_' He pondered for a little while as he read on. Nothing seemed to interest him more at the moment, and when the first warning bell went off he was sort of disappointed that he couldn't have continued absorbing the materiel on the pages. It got to the point where he decided to read-and-walk along the corridors because he was so enthralled. It was working at first, until he accidentally knocked over someone's schoolbooks, that is.

Out of habit, he reached down to help pick things up automatically, and then, swiftly headed off to his Math class – a test was awaiting him there.

Once inside the aforementioned class, he took his seat as usual, set out the necessary things he'd needed for the calculus quiz when another teacher (a science teacher) came in. He had several photocopies in one hand, with the all-too familiar pink substitute teacher slip along with the attendance sheet clutched in the other. Squall was not amused by a long shot.

'_I worked myself ragged last night studying for this test, and the teacher isn't even here? That stack of papers better be the test – or at least part of it…_'

"Everyone," The science teacher boomed to catch the classroom occupants' attention, "Mr. Kiren isn't here today because he's sick with the cold that's been going around, so he instructed me to hand out roughly half of the test, seeing as you'll need the special graphic calculators that aren't accessible today. The directions he gave on the work plan indicate that once you are done, hand it in and you'll be free to leave as long as you are quiet outside of the classroom, otherwise, you'll have to stay for the duration."

'_Not bad, maybe I'll get some time to read…_' Squall pondered as the substitute handed out the pages.

"Okay, begin your tests now. I'll be circulating to make sure there's no cheating."

'_This is going to be a piece of cake…_'

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40 minutes later, Squall submitted his semi-test and strode out with his things. Sure it was a piece of cake, but it did take him longer than he thought on some questions because he found little errors that didn't pan out at first – but it was nothing he couldn't resolve.

'_Okay, I've got… 35 minutes to do something, not nearly enough time to start reading again, maybe I should just-_'

"...Squall?" A voice behind him called out loudly.

"_Hmm…?_" He mumbled, turning around.

"You forgot your pen. I thought I'd return it to you." The speaker, Selphie, explained in an unnaturally calm manner. Then she handed him the black ballpoint pen to him.

"…Thanks - I suppose…where did I leave it?"

"I don't know, Rinoa just told me to give it to you. She's actually the one who found it. Bye!" The brunette answered quickly before hopping down the stairs. Squall paused for a moment and glanced at the pen before following suit.

'_This isn't my pen… You're crafty as ever Rinoa, I'll give you that. But it still won't work. I know where you sit at fourth.'_

"Squall?" A second someone hesitantly asked; interrupting his train of thought altogether. It was Rinoa.

"…_What?_" He retorted suspiciously, standing on the first step of the stairwell.

"Selphie… took my extra pen and must have given to you so we'd…talk." Rinoa awkwardly clarified along with a bit of a blush forming on her facial features.

"…Why would she do something like that?"

"I'm not sure, but I think she might have seen you walk away Friday …and a bit of the end of the conversation too…" She added, face reddening furthermore as the uncomfortable silent gap deepened.

'_This is very awkward… Better give her the pen and leave._' He thought rapidly.

"…Here." Squall added briefly, while returning the pen to her and swiftly left, leaving no space for any further broken-up conversation. Somehow, if even at all plausible, they both experienced the same pit-of-your-stomach butterflies – at the same time miraculously.

'_This isn't how I envisioned spending my free time by talking to people. Maybe I should read that book to get it off my mind…' _

After reading for _about…_ two minutes, Squall found it nearly impossible to continue reading in the library. Other evading thoughts, notions and ideas continuously came and went, and all of them related to what happened earlier.

'_Why did Selphie do that?_'

'_-More importantly, why did Rinoa come after me? It's just a pen… Besides, I would have put it on her desk at fourth…_'

'_The thing annoys me the most is that uncomfortable feeling after I had after I left… Was it- **butterflies?** What is it about the situation that makes it so unnerving? Wait- no it can't be… So that's what that was? No… can't…I just can't._'

Much later, right before the official 'end-of-third-period' bell tolled, Rinoa had come in briefly to renew her books. She couldn't help but to take a glance at her formerly-imprisoned partner, who had just recently attempted to read once more. As their eyes eventually met for a split-second, the same tension ensued, the same nervous feelings poured in, the same damn everything came flooding back.

Rinoa, the more inquisitive and affected of the two, had enough of this emotional strain going on between them and the additional stress it provided. And most importantly out of all this; she wanted to know why this was, and why that the uncomfortable situations kept happening whenever they saw each other.

But first of all, a library wasn't the best place for finding anything out like this and the setting had to be changed immediately; not after school, not during class – right now was the time it **had** to be done. So in order to achieve that, she mustered all of the strength and audacity she had and did the deed and basically (but effectively) yanked him out of his chair and dragged him out to the much more desolate adjacent amphitheatre by his shirt collar.

"_**What the hell did you do** **that for?**" _He yelled angrily. Rinoa knew that she'd caught him completely off-guard.

"Why didn't you **_say_** anything?" She retorted heatedly, matching his tone exactly, minus the rage. This managed to alleviate the edge and anger present in Squall's demeanor as it turned to a confused sentiment.

"…Say nothing to _what?_" He replied, being hopelessly perplexed.

"To all of those things I confessed on Friday for _Hyne's sake!_"

'_I don't know, I guess I was… confused or something…Something was bothering me… but I couldn't do anything about it…It wouldn't come._' He automatically thought in reaction, as opposed to saying anything.

"Squall, just spit it out please… I don't care what it is, just say it, don't think it."

"…I think I was confused, or something… I don't know! _Can I just leave now?_ I don't want to be late for class."

"No, because that wasn't a straight answer, and we're not leaving until I get one. I don't want to still be in shadows about this. I don't care if you just tell that you don't share the same feelings as I do, I just want to know the truth."

'_That's not the case Rinoa… I just can't…_'

"……I just can't… I can't-" At this moment, Squall found it impossible to look at her face directly. Instead, he opted to drop his head, bangs covering his facial expression somewhat and look at the floor beneath her.

"-I can't accept this."

"What do you mean Squall?" She asked in wondering, her eyes starting to glaze themselves with a crystalline emotion.

"I can't accept… what you've said…" He repeated again, somehow more cryptically than the last time.

"_I…I…don't understand you… W-what_ are you trying to say here Squall?"

'_It's that I cannot comprehend why you'd have a thing about me in that way Rinoa. That's what I've been trying to say. Why attempt to try and love someone like me? Simple lust is what I thought you had, not …anything deeper… Lust is normal for teenagers, nothing else… I mean crushes come and go, blinding the lesser qualities… That's doable… but real affection? What's there to love about a recluse hiding his true self away, fearing of getting hurt again? Nothing. There's NOTHING! If I were any different, maybe, or if the accident that took away my mother and sister never happened, I might have been more accepting to this… But, it still stands, as is, I can't, I just damn-well can't…'_

Nothing else was said, nothing else was answered. Squall just stood here, eyes pleading with some expression, while his remaining features left almost blank. The warning bell had interrupted their silence, and Squall left slowly and painfully as he did on Friday; leaving Rinoa in the same position, this time with her heart twice-broken.

Five minutes later, after he arrived to the classroom and the history lesson of the day had just begun, Squall inadvertently kept on looking for Rinoa to come in class, because she'd not entered before the bell, the every ten minutes he glanced at her empty seat eventually shortened to seven, then five, and then finally two - until the class had ended.

She never did come to class, and it got Squall to thinking about what he'd said.

'_What have I done?…It's not that I just can't accept what she's saying, it's that I won't let myself… I don't want to take the chance of hurting her… Everyone I've ever loved have all gotten hurt… and I can't have that happen again, I'd… fall apart and break down mentally if I went through that… I couldn't take it if it ever were to occur all over…Sorry Rinoa.'_

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The next day, Squall literally felt as if he were on the verge of dying as the cold came back, more virulent than ever. He could scarcely breathe because his nose was so thoroughly blocked, he was two shades away from looking like a sleep-depraved cadaver, and he had virtually no energy whatsoever. Heck, he couldn't even keep his balance while standing up for five seconds for Hyne's sake. Although it wasn't in his nature to be so frail and sickly like this at all, but during the once in a blue moon, extremely rare times that he'd fall ill, he usually had it bad. Actually, the last time he was sick like this was when he was 4-years old. Even then, it wasn't even comparable to this.

Needless to point out, he didn't think, say, or **do **anything during the next two days he'd stayed home re-cooperating. What he'd done for the period of that time was somewhat similar to what he'd done on the weekend but without the physical capacity or even the mental one to force himself to get out of bed half of the time. But when the crippling affliction came to lessen to a bearable state in the late Wednesday afternoon, he eventually came downstairs for more than two minutes and sat down in his living room and read, after managing to tolerate eating a little bit and taking some over-the-counter medicine though.

'_This is better; although the stupid medicine is making me restless…It's like I'm tired yet somehow hyper at the same time…If that's even possible…Wonder what they did in school today. Whatever…I should forget about it, I'll be swamped in it tomorrow…_' As soon as he'd stopped thinking for a split second, the phone rang, and being the only once there at the moment (His father was working – If anyone could even call it that), Squall got up promptly to answer it.

"…_Hello?_"

'_-Bzzt…' _Whoever it was had just hung up on him. Squall didn't care one bit, figuring that it was probably someone who dialed the wrong number or a telemarketer who accidentally called twice after realizing that he'd already suckered Laguna into buying something. His father happened to be bad with handling telemarketers; meanwhile Squall was adept in pissing them off. These days, nobody could find a more different father and son like Squall and Laguna even if they tried.

So in conclusion, the aforementioned teenager spent the whole night reading (and ignoring his father once he came home) and went to school the following day on Thursday. Many took notice of his increased pallor and a few pounds off of his now-slight frame. Some commented to him, while others murmured between themselves, but overall, he didn't care; he was more annoyed than anything. After he'd put away some things in his locker and overheard the morning announcements, his mind shifted to something similar, like how he was treated at the hospital a little while ago (and what was coming up on this Friday's S.D/Weaponry class while he was at it as well).

'This reminds me of that paranoid_ hospital doctor kept on droning on about to me… If he saw me now, Hyne, I'd be ready to bet a million gil that he'd have three clipboards filled along with a lengthy lecture on 'the dangers of being underweight'…I swear that he's an idiot or something…Besides, it's not like I'm doing this on purpose and it'll come back on. Hmm…I wonder what I'll have to do for that major test in S.D tomorrow… Better not be random partners again… Last time, I almost nailed Seifer in the head because he was being such a moron…_'

While retracing his steps to head to the library as he _always_ did in the morning, Squall noticed something peculiar between the trips from his locker to his destination and back. It wasn't the people staring (that never fazed him), but it was rather a lack of a something… actually, more like a _somebody _who wasn't there. As soon as he noted on the lack of friction today, he knew exactly what the missing link was– Rinoa _wasn't_ here.

'_This is weird…_' He thought in the middle of the second section of his half-a-test in math. '_Why am I complaining about the lack of tension at school? Have I gone insane? I wonder why she's not here though…_'

That last question he sought seemed to vaguely answer itself via overhearing people, mainly her friends, discuss on the subject. The possibilities of her absence were that she was either:

a) Depressed about something that her friends didn't know about and wasn't mentally capable of coming into school.

b) She'd caught the cold that was going around and was too sick to come to school.

c) Or a combination of a) **and** b), whereas she got so depressed by seeing someone sick that she became mentally incapable to stay at school and went home.

Seeing as she came to school, looking very healthy and did not show any lingering signs of ever being sick in S.D/Weaponry class (and kept on avoiding his gaze too); Squall figured that '_option c_)' was most likely candidate for the root of the problem yesterday. It became very apparent after attendance was taken, and class had actually started.

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"Okay, for a certain number of students, today's evaluation **will** count as your final exam, instead of only counting as a regular evaluation. The reason behind this sudden change is because I've noticed that many of you have mastered - or even surpassed of all of the materiel set for the semester, far faster than I would have ever expected. And by being held back, you won't benefit at all. But the good news is that I'll allow anyone who's eligible; I mean those who passed an exam, to take my advanced class on every first period other than the Fridays reserved for this class, any questions?"

"How will we know if we've gotten a regular test or an exam?" A girl with light-brown hair inquired.

"I'll be meeting with each group and notify them whether they were doing an exam or a normal evaluation. Does that answer your question Ms. Reed?" She nodded immediately, then Mr. Janis scanned some more for any other questions.

"How will the groups be formed if some people aren't doing the same thing?" Selphie obviously asked because she'd only joined last week.

"Well… Ms. Tilmitt, since there are students with various levels of skill; I'll be the one picking the groups. But don't worry; I'll work something out for you, seeing as you are new to the class. Are there any last questions? No takers? I guess I'll start now assigning the groups now."

'_Damn, it's going to be random again… Well it's not like I'd want to work with any of these people in the first place… I just hope it's not Seifer again…I don't feel like restraining myself every two seconds from hitting him somewhere painful…_'

After the teacher had grouped together most of the students, minus the exempt Selphie, Squall was anxiously awaiting for whom he'd get paired up with amid feelings of nervousness and anticipation. The reason for this was because he'd mentally taken note of all of those picked already, and those who where left was Seifer, that first girl who asked Janis a question, and Rinoa. So essentially, all of those who were left for him to be grouped with was someone who didn't like him, someone who didn't know him, and someone who didn't want to even look at him.

No matter who he stuck was with, he'd end up being screwed over royally.

"Okay, next the next group will consist of…" Mr. Janis paused to write down the names on his list, increasing the tension furthermore.

"Olivia Reed and …" He stopped again when he'd dropped his pencil.

'_Come on! Get this over with! You don't need your stinking pencil; there are only 4 of us left! Just choose already!_' Squall mentally screamed; he'd gotten fed up of all of the delays by now.

"-and Rinoa Heartilly. So, that leaves …Almasy and Leonhart together…I've got this all written down… Olivia, Rinoa, you may go first." He announced to the dismay of Squall. Now he'd be stuck with Seifer again. Oh joy.

As Rinoa and the other girl prepared to be examined for either the test or a possible exam, the teacher had realized something. Something he'd forgotten about.

"Oops, I'm sorry girls, but I had forgotten that I had accidentally put two people with the same partners again… Olivia you'll be placed with Mr. Dincht and Rinoa, you'll be with Ms. Trepe."

"_Umm…_"

"What is it Ms. Heartilly?"

"I've already been with Quistis. We were partners for the last test."

"Oh, I'm sorry…" The S.D teacher stopped to apologize for a brief moment, "Then I'll just put you with Mr. Leonhart, I had forgotten that he was already paired up with Mr. Almasy before as well. So Squall, please switch with Olivia and begin when ready."

Both teenagers were kind of stunned by the switch at first. Then, after the initial jolt had subsided, another one had set in – the jolt of them actually having to work with one another. It was so bad that Squall was the one who had to say something.

"…Just do as we did before and we'll be fine, I promise." He quickly whispered to Rinoa.

"-_Okay_." She rapidly mouthed back before signaling to the teacher that they were ready. "Mr. Janis, we can start now."

"All right Rinoa. Now all you guys will have to do is just perform the drills that I'll be announcing to you in order and your turn will be over. Rinoa, start with defensive pattern number three, Squall, follow her with the according attack drills. _-Go!_"

As soon as they started, there was an unexplained elegance and smoothness in the execution of their various movements together. To anyone who was watching, this became very noticeable very quickly. It was also undeniable that the sheer dynamics of their pairing was nearly ethereal. It was so evident that, by the end of it, Mr. Janis forgot about waiting to meet with them later as he announced proudly (and loudly), 'Now that was incredible! Squall, Rinoa, I'm giving you full marks for that marvelous performance. Congratulations, you two have passed your final exam with flying colours!'.

Even with their prior awkwardness with each other, with this amount of attention, they momentarily forgot about the troubles between themselves and walked away together from the spotlight. Their faces were both slightly red from embarrassment; the two of them were too humble to be able to bask in it. After their uncomfortable instant, it had been shifted towards another group's as they were next to be subjected to the scrutiny, then Rinoa found a bit of time to make some light conversation.

"I guess…that all of that practice came in handy…" She mumbled sheepishly to Squall, who was formerly watching the subsequent pair, noting the errors mentally as he looked on.

"…_I sup-_" The currently-replying adolescent was rudely interrupted by an overly loud and obnoxious statement. And it wasn't too hard to figure out where that overly loud and obnoxious statement was coming from.

"Look at the little lovebirds whispering to each other," Seifer mockingly exaggerated, "_…are we discussing the details for the shotgun wedding?_"

Everyone stopped to stare at the scene that the tall blonde was causing. The loud tone was enough to even get the teacher's attention from evaluating for Hyne's sake. All of the attention was on the pair and Seifer.

"Seifer can you please bothering us…You know as well as everyone else that we didn't do anything like _that_." Rinoa countered back irritably.

"Well it's hard to think otherwise when the majority of the people here know that the only reason you did so good was because you probably practiced between makeout sessions during that weekend. Am I right Puberty _Bo-_"

'_WHACK!'_

Normally, it wasn't in Squall's nature to punch someone hard like that, but today, he had no self-control left anymore in relation to Seifer's irritating jokes. He simply couldn't take it, as it was too much of an insult to be ignored.

…_And besides_, it was long overdue as retaliation for all of those years of making him suffer anyways.

A minor scuffle followed when Seifer tried to get back at him, but Squall managed to dodge most of it and emerged the winner somehow, albeit receiving a severely bloody nose and after the students and teacher managed to finally separate them.

"I'm very disappointed in both of you," Mr. Janis angrily shouted, "… you two are going to receive a suspension today for fighting like that, and I don't want to hear anything about it. Squall, go get something to stop the bleeding and wait in my office until I come back; and Seifer, follow me. And for the rest of you, class dismissed!"

After the S.D teacher had left with Seifer, Squall followed instructions and went into the locker room to take care of the situation with the bleeding, and maybe change. Since no guy wanted to even be near the most likely livid Leonhart, they all went elsewhere to change or simply waited. However, Rinoa was the only brave soul to enter the same room with him.

For an odd reason however, nobody bothered commenting on why she went into the **guys'** change room, as they all knew her too well.

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"Squall!" Rinoa shouted once she was inside. At that moment, Squall turned around from the bloodied basin, with a stained ball of toilet paper bunched up in his right hand. His face wasn't still bleeding profusely as it was before though.

"…What are you doing here?"

'_I know that you liked the place, but come on…this is a bit ridiculous, even for you Rinoa…_'

"…I just wanted to thank you for standing up to him." She said, almost forgetting about their previously uneasy situation.

"…Oh, okay."

"Actually…I also came in here because… I kind of wanted to know…why exactly you did what you did to Seifer? If it's okay with you…" She uncomfortably added. No answer was heard from Squall for a little while, but he finally replied when he gained a little composure and really thought it through.

"…I suppose that I did it because…it felt like an insult to what we had to suffer through… With the uncertainty, lack of energy, hardships, and well… just about everything really."

"I see what you mean…" Rinoa agreed aloud to his justifications, although he did phrase it to make seem like he'd forgotten about her part in their avoidable imprisonment. Maybe there was hope for him after all, and _perhaps_… it might be the time to ask him about the truth …_about _both Friday and Monday. Just maybe…

"_Squ-_"

"…Rinoa, if you don't mind, I'd like to get changed, can you leave please…"

As much as she'd like to stay and watch, she complied with his wishes and left. In her opinion, he went through enough today to last a week. After all, she wasn't the one who had gotten beat up. When she had left, Squall started thinking the last thought for what would be for a long time.

'_Why _wasn't _there as much tension like the other times? Has it passed, or was it only temporary? Okay, I've had enough this. Enough of the same thoughts, enough of the same wondering, enough of the same …everything that I've been doing to myself. Being locked inside like this isn't working anymore…and I truly think that I've outgrown it. Even if I don't like admitting it, I can't keep it in like this and pretending like it's not happening, because it **is** happening - regardless of anything she does, did or anything else for that matter. I've got to learn to take risks if I want to keep my sanity any longer because what I'm doing is causing me more heartache and complications than the heartache and complications I was trying to prevent. Right now, I've got to take the first and ultimate step; admitting it to myself. Finally admitting that I might actually… _'

After reflecting upon that last thought, Squall changed quickly, hoping to catch Rinoa before she headed too far from where he was supposed to be waiting in the teacher's office.

"…Rinoa?" He called out from behind her, outside of the gym door. When she did turn around, she was genuinely surprised.

"Oh…I didn't realize that it was you, Squall. Is something wrong?"

"…No, not really. But I'd like to discuss something."

"What is it that you want to discuss?"

"Well…I was sort of wondering if.. you could… _Hmm…_ _how can I say it-_" After this, Rinoa knew that something was odd because Squall **never **stuttered like that, nor did he ever talk to her without a nervous tone either.

"Squall, are you feeling okay?" She inquired, getting more worried about his behaviour.

"No… Not really, listen-" He started to reply in a serious tone, nervousness aside. "…I'll tell you about why I've been avoiding talking to you about those things… if you can manage to find an empty place to meet after school."

"Sur_e…o-okay._" Rinoa said automatically, not fully taking in what she'd just heard. It was as if the dead-serious tone and penetrating stare from his cerulean eyes was almost too intense to believe. But since she knew Squall to be an honest individual when he said seemingly important things like that, she wasn't in the position to question him.

However, with the complications with the only indoor suspension that he'd ever had in his life, Squall wasn't sure if he'd even be able to meet with Rinoa later on. He couldn't be let out until the vice principal was done talking to his father on the phone. Even after the long phone call had ended, the authoritative figure wanted him to speak with him directly in his office.

Fortunately, he had somehow been let off the hook because of what Laguna had told the subordinate principal about Squall's long painful history with Seifer, but it was far too late to talk with Rinoa.

It was 3:05… and school had ended at 2:15.

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Right before suppertime, Squall was working hard to catch up on the work that the teachers gave him, lesson pages and all. Everything took him a little longer because some of the lessons weren't very helpful without the teacher's explanations backing them up. It got so tedious in certain places that he was ready to give up. Until he thought upon the idea of calling someone. _But who?_ The first problem was that nobody shared all of his classes, and secondly, he didn't know most of the people's numbers in the first place. I mean, who'd want to give him their phone numbers?

'_Knock. Knock._'

"Don't tell me he forgot his keys again…" He mumbled after going down the stairs, but before opening the door.

"Hi. Can I come in?" A cheery voice asked. However, it wasn't his father's cheery voice greeting him at the entrance.

For the second time today, Squall replied, '…What are you doing here?' directed towards Rinoa. Although this time was indeed in stranger conditions than the last context he'd used that same phrase in.

"Well, seeing as you were stuck inside the office, I thought that I'd come visit you at your house to talk…about it. Is your dad home?"

"…No."

"Oh. What time will he be back by?"

"I don't really know- it always changes day to day… It's usually after five though. _–Wait…_Can we do this another time, I've got a lot of other things I need to take care of."

"Like tons of homework that you don't understand?"

"…How did you know about that?"

"I had that problem in grade eleven once. I kept on coming late to first, so they suspended me for a day and the lessons the teachers gave me didn't make sense, until I phoned people in my class to explain it. I could help you with your Math and History homework if you'd like. I promise not to go all specific on your papers like we were stuck inside though. What do you say?"

If he hadn't been stuck in the learning rut that he'd been, Squall would have said no to this somewhat embarrassing situation, but seeing as he would kill two chocobos with one stone, he agreed.

"…Okay."

While they were together helping Squall with his homework issues on the dining room table, he noticed that Rinoa's brief, quick-to-the-point explanations started to shorten some more as time went on. He perfectly knew that she was getting very anxious, and that this little diversion was starting to wear very thin, almost see-through even. But he was the one who felt more and more nervous, as he could tell that the time of telling her was drawing ever closer. It was the personality traits derived from his protective shell (that he'd obviously grown very accustomed to) which were causing him to feel this way. It was also the source for him to even consider having cold feet on what he'd planned on doing, but he was determined to stick it out. After all, human relationships aren't always clear-cut, nor were just sunshine and rainbows, were they?

"…So you're all done, and fit to do your Math and History. Anything else you need help on? I trust that the English stuff was hard too, right? I had Mrs. Pine last year and she was no picnic." She jokingly concluded. This was the perfect way to start telling her. Squall had a thinking look present on his face, but he wasn't actually thinking for a change. He was just contemplating briefly on how to phrase the most pivotal moment in his life to date. Once he was confident enough to start articulate the single word to launch a paragraph of an eternity (it was, '_Rin-_'), the phone interrupted him.

"**_-Hello?_**" He answered hotly, being very close to marching over and killing the person on the other end with the butter knife on the kitchen table.

"Oh, it's you Squall."

"…Duh." It was his hopeless father; the teenager supposed that parricide was now out of the question.

"Okay, even I _know_ that sounded dumb, but half of the time you never answer the phone and-"

"-Get to the point." He cut in acidly.

"Fine. I'm staying overnight at a hotel for a necessary meeting that I had just found out about today."

"Or did you just forget about it… until now?" Squall acerbically added.

"Yes. Are you _happy?_"

"Of course." He smugly replied.

"I hate it when you do that; you're just like your mother. Well, bye."

'_Thank Hyne I at least took after the more competent parent…_' He thought cynically.

"Was that your dad, Squall?" Rinoa wondered, since she was out of the loop of the conversation.

"Yes, unfortunately..." He answered as he plucked out the phone jack while talking. This action confused her somewhat.

"Why, is he…coming home _now?_"

"…No. Actually, he won't be home for a while. Unplanned meeting."

"Oh, I see."

"Rinoa, can you come follow me into my father's office…" He asked nervously, trying to keep this as simple as humanly possible. She immediately nodded her head in agreement, being fully aware of where he was going with this.

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After they taken the few steps to get there, he immediately picked up the picture frame that Rinoa had noticed when she was here the first time.

"…Remember how you had asked about this photo, and it seemed like I was trying to avoid the question?"

At that moment, it felt like the opportune time to tell him about knowing of his sister and mother's demise. Rinoa seized this chance like there was no tomorrow and managed to handle it delicately, trying not to detract of its' seriousness.

"Squall… I have a confession to make." She paused before continuing her somber statement to ready herself.

"…I already know of what happened to your mother and sister. I …figured it out when you didn't say anything. I know that they died and…I'm sorry if my question might have upset you during my last visit."

When he had heard that, his conscious felt much lighter upon realizing that she'd already known about the most vital and most difficult subject to convey into clear speech. Also, since the hardest part of his explanation had been alleviated earlier, it felt kind of good to have off of his chest.

"…It's okay Rinoa. I knew that it was just a simple question, and that you didn't mean anything by it. Actually, when you just said that you'd already known, it made it a little easier… admitting all of this." Squall took a lengthy breath, before continuing on.

"The reason why…I didn't say anything to you on those days was because…I was afraid."

"…Afraid? Why? You could have said no…"

"No, it wasn't as simple as that…The reason why I wasn't saying anything was… I didn't want to hurt you."

"Hurt me? How?"

"…Well, going through two family deaths at the same time was truly an extremely horrible experience. Since it happened when I was only five, it felt like I'd be never happy again, once it actually sunk in that… they were really gone. So in order to make sure that I'd never go through that again, I promised myself to-"

"-never become close to anyone ever again, so you'd never have to go through it ever again… _even_ if it meant that you'd never be… _happy?_" She uncannily predicted. For the first time in his life, he smiled at her assumption, even though it wasn't a direct smile; he was looking at the held picture.

"Actually, you're only half-right, that's what I… _used to think_. As a little child, people assumed that this new distant nature that I had developed would eventually go way as time passed on, when I'd learn to accept their deaths, but I never did. As I grew up, that initial thought grew …into two separate thoughts. The first one was obviously the 'I don't want to get hurt again', but, the second one was… more of a, 'I don't want anyone to get closer to me because everyone I've ever been close to have all gotten hurt, and I don't want to harm them.'."

"Now I understand. This explains everything…" Rinoa thought aloud, but before she could say any more, he clarified the details further.

"Actually, the last thing I said wasn't exactly accurate…"

"-What do you mean _by_?"

"…You know about that second thought?" He asked, while putting down the photo and finally looked at her, square in the eye. This was the most difficult thing he'd have to do, seeing as her eyes nearly recoiled from his serious tone and gaze.

"Yes."

"Well…" He couldn't maintain the connection with her face and dropped his head ever so slightly, to avoid looking at her own emotionally-charged gaze. If he would have tried to do this before, even it were only a day ago, there would have been absolutely no way he'd ever be able to pull off even saying two syllables to her shadow. But today, he managed to succeed beautifully in articulating his emotions in a complete and coherent way – even if he **_was_** saying it to her neck.

"The truth is that… I only started contemplating of that second thought after you'd told me everything on Monday. It was… the first time I'd thought of someone other than myself. My problem was always, '_**I** don't ever want to be hurt again_', but when I first heard about what you'd done to me on that Friday, I jumped to the conclusion that you'd hurt me and proved my point right, and that I'd always end up hurt if I'd ever tried to get close to someone. Well, that was **before** you explained yourself, but when you did, I was confused because I wasn't angry, just frustrated for some reason. I just couldn't understand why I couldn't hate you for what you did. But the truth was…"

At this moment, Squall finally looked at her deep brown eyes and said,

"…because I realized later on that…my true feelings about you didn't care about what you'd did, and… that's why I couldn't answer you on Monday, because it was right after I'd left was where I started caring more about not hurting you rather then to avoid getting myself hurt."

"…So what you meant was that, you didn't answer me straight because you liked me but couldn't accept it yourself since you thought, that by becoming close to me, you'd be afraid that I'd…get hurt?"

He nodded, agreeing with her interpretation. Then, she resumed talking, fully aware of what she was going to say next was as dangerous as poking a sleeping Ruby Dragon with a pointy stick.

"Squall, you've got to realize that just because half of your family died on you at a young age, doesn't mean that everyone you'll ever become close to will get hurt… I'm sure that it was just an unlucky incident, nothing more. As for your fear of getting hurt again, you just have to let it go. It's only natural to have highs and lows in your life. People don't live forever - whether you want them to or not, and you've… just got to accept that."

"-But I can't! I can't bear being taken away from everything like that again! Don't you see?" He countered vehemently.

"But you didn't lose everything! You actually have a father who loves you! When my mother died… I was the one who lost everything, not you. My father…he stopped caring and loving me, like a father should have done, after she'd died in an accident. But thing was, I had done the **exact** same thing you did when she…was no longer here. I stopped talking to people, I ignored them… I essentially cut them off for the same reasons you did… But you know what? It didn't work."

She paused to refrain herself from crying in front of him, the memory of her mother's death was far more potent than she'd ever guessed. After she'd rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, she felt well enough to go on.

"It didn't work because the agony from not being able to be with the others hurt. It hurt ten times more than the thought of the pain that their eventual deaths would bring. When I learned to simply accept it, things turned out for the better. Because I was finally accepting that nobody lives forever and that I should live for life's special moments, and have support from people, rather than trivializing over the point that they'll all be gone someday. Life's too precious to be continuously unhappy in order keep it simple, rather then to be loved by others while they're still around."

Squall stood there transfixed from everything that Rinoa had just said. The big surprise was mainly the simplicity of it all.

'_I kept on worrying about the worst things about the future, and never on the good things that come from the present… I think that…now, I'm fully ready to let go of this and take that first step. Thank you Rinoa, thank you so much…_'

When he was done thinking, Squall unknowingly did two things on impulse that he'd never thought he'd ever do in his life. First, he leaned towards her and embraced her very securely like a broken man finding out that it would turn out alright for him in the end. Second, was that when she wriggled out of from his arms, he was actually taken aback, and eyed her with a very perplexed stare and thought, '_Why did you do that?_'. But her reasons weren't as simple as that.

"Before you do anything like that, there's still the matter of you actually answering my question." She jokingly insisted, with a broad smirk present on her face. Squall was happy to oblige to continue the amusing charade.

"…Whatever."

"And…just to remind you, we're not leaving until I get a straight answer." When Rinoa tried to act super-serious, her emerging grin kept on ruining the airs she was supposed to be portraying. So she ended up giving Squall a comically irate look - instead of a regular irritated one.

"…Fine." He said in mock-protest, keeping the setting somewhat alive.

"I don't want to still be in shadows about this. I don't…_hee_… care what you tell me, even if you don't share the same feelings as I do, I …I…just want to know_…_ k…now… the…_pfft…_ truth."

It was a good thing that Rinoa didn't need to say anymore, because she was cracking up badly. Bad enough whereas, it wasn't at all serious anymore, but it didn't matter regardless. Squall was serious enough during the entire time to compensate for the both of them anyway.

"…Do you really want to know?" He enticingly prompted. Soon, an indisputable grin formed coyly on his features.

"Sure. Why not." Rinoa agreed, after regaining some real composure, not knowing where he was going with this.

'_Well, if you really want to know, I think that…_'

He gently took hold of her left hand, pulled her closer to himself, and, when she was expecting another hug- he kissed her so delicately and romantically on the spot that, for once, she was the one who barely believed what was happening, and not the usual other way around. Even after it was over and their lips had parted, she saw him in the same formerly- unheard of smile that she'd come to adore within the first split-second of seeing it.

"You look… so much better when you smile." She mentioned shyly, along with a healthy blush on her face.

"…I think that it might have been long overdue." He managed to squeak in, before she was the one hugging him tightly.

Their embrace had kept an untainted seriousness until Rinoa playfully whispered, '_…and who knew that you were such an excellent kisser-_' in his ear, causing some parts of his face to redden as well to evenly match hers. Several moments passed thereafter in which they shared an uncomplicated, silent bond together, and the only thing that broke in their encirclement, was its' mere silence.

"._..I love you Rinoa._"

And from that moment on, neither one of them were locked inside ever again.

_-The End- _

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**End of story comments – **Well, that was a surprise; I'd thought that this was going to end up as the shortest chapter and _it ended up being the longest! _Go figure…

So, that's the end of the _Locked Inside _series, I hope that you thoroughly liked that last chapter, enjoyed the places where I've made fun of myself and the story (if you can find them…) and the title's dual meaning. Also, I'd like to send my thanks to everyone those taken the time to read my story and as well to those who've helped me make it better.

This is the last time I'll be saying this _but…_keep on reviewing with ideas, comments or anything you guys have to say!

Thank you guys so,_ very, very_ much!

-_Sincerely,_ Emerald-Latias


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